44% students in Mumbai attend offline classes as schools reopen

While all civic body- and government-run schools reopened for children, some city schools still need more days to prepare. Out of a total of 4,043 schools in the city, 3,850 reopened on Monday. There are a total of 16,35,370 students in these schools from classes 1 to 12. Out of these, only 7,20,092 attended offline classes on Monday. The data was collated by the BMC education department and office of Deputy Director of Education (DyDE) where the former is the nodal body for primary education and the latter, for secondary and higher secondary education.

While the response on the first day was below 50 per cent, schools and teachers are hopeful the numbers will increase gradually as offline learning continues. They felt parents are still taking stock of the situation. “We believe that more students will start coming after Wednesday…,” said Rajendra Pradhan, Trustee President of D S High School in Sion. “My daughter is in Junior KG. Since the time her school admission has been finalised, it has been an online affair. The excitement was high today (Monday) as she finally got to go to school,” said Moneshi Shah whose daughter goes to Oberoi International School. Some private schools are going to take a few more days to reopen for offline classes.

School originally resumed offline classes in Maharashtra from December 15. Most schools then took Christmas break from December 23 to January 2. When they resumed on January 3, BMC issued a notification asking them to go back to online functioning amid rising Covid cases in the city.

With the number of Covid cases ebbing in parts of the state, on January 20, the government approved reopening of schools with permission from local administration.