Patnaik to do a Modi on Nov 14, will address over 6L students
Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik will address lakhs of school children and their parents through a televised speech on November 14 — Children’s Day — over three years after Prime Minister Narendra Modi interacted with students on Teachers’ Day in a similar way.
This is the first time that Patnaik will address more than 660,000 students in the state’s 62,000 schools in his 17-year tenure as chief minister. He earlier attended a state-level event, Suravi, to mark Children’s Day but this year ,the scale of celebration is said to be grander.
The school and mass education department has asked government and government-aided schools to make arrangements for the students to listen to Patnaik’s address between 11.15am and 12pm on Children’s Day. Officials said headmasters and school management committee members will contact villagers who own TVs with set-top box to facilitate the process in villages.
Meetings of the school management committee and parentteachers’ association will be held in each school to ensure the presence of both students and parents when the CM’s speech is telecast. Also, school authorities will have to submit status report on attendance of the students by 3pm.
The department has also suggested schools should conduct a debate and essay competition on
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various topics, including on Patnaik being awarded the best chief minister of the country two months ago.
Patnaik’s address comes at a time when his Biju Janata Dal (BJD) is increasingly worried about a resurgent BJP, now the main opposition party, mounting a steady attack on the government’s failures.
Modi was criticised by opposition parties over his address on Teacher’s Day in 2014 as the Congress called it a case of self propaganda. Patnaik, too, is sailing in the same boat. The debate topic ‘Proud Odisha: Our CM got best administrator award’ suggested for students of classes 8-10 is being seen by opposition parties as a blatant attempt to politicise school education.
“No politician in the past has ever tried to politicise school education. But Naveen babu is worried that the BJD base is eroding and that’s why this crude attempt to brainwash minds of kids,” BJP spokesperson Sajjan Sharma said. “The government is hardly bothered about the condition of school building, standard of education, and appointment of teachers but how to reap political harvest from the education sector,” Sharma added.
BJD spokesperson Sasmit Patra, however, said Patnaik’s address was more out of his personal interest to leave a legacy and inspire the next generation “with his thought process”.
“After 17 years as the chief minister, he has nothing left to achieve... The school children are surely not voting in the next election and so any allegations of politicisation are needless. The CM takes interest in children and likes to interact with children,” he said.