183 govt schools closed due to lack of students
PITHORAGARH: Around 183 government schools have been closed in Pithoragarh district in the last three years due to hill migration resulting in lack of students in villages, chief education officer (CEO) Pithoragarh district Ashok Kumar Jukaria said on Wednesday.
“Besides closure of these 158 primary and 25 junior schools, we have a total 120 schools in the district with just one teacher who caters to the classes from class 1 to 8th,” said Jukaria.
“Furthermore, the district has over 445 primary and 20 junior high schools which have only one student there,” the officer added.
According to the chief education officer, this situation has arisen due to migration from villages to nearby towns or metros in search of good education and jobs.
Jukaria said the efforts to provide quality education in government schools are underway to minimise migration from the villages.
Migration of people from villages is one of the major issues faced by the Himalayan state, with roots in economic disparities, declining agriculture, low rural incomes and a stressed rural economy.
The state government constituted the rural development and migration commission in August 2017 to examine all aspects of the problem, evolve a vision for the focused development of the rural areas and submit recommendations to the government on how to reduce migration. The commission had submitted its first statewide report on migration in 2018.
According to the interim second statewide report prepared by the commission in March last year, permanent migration in the last five years (between 2018 and 2022) has come down significantly, while temporary migration has increased. The survey covered 7,759 gram panchayats in 95 blocks across 13 districts of the state. Over 118,000 people permanently migrated from their native places in all 13 districts between 2011 and 2018 at an average of 16,857 per year. In comparison, 28,531 people migrated from their villages between 2018 and 2022 at an average of 7,132 per year.