NEW DELHI: A day after reports came in that a BJP councilor and chairperson of the education committee in the South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) wrote to the department instructing officials to ensure that students attend school only in the prescribed uniform and not in “clothing aligned to religion”, the education department said they have not issued any order related to this and what the councilor said was in her personal capacity.
Chairperson of the committee, Nitika Sharma, who is a councilor from Dwarka, on Friday handed over the letter to the zonal offices asking all officials to ensure that students stick to school uniforms, except for “school events and programmes where they may be allowed to wear the dress code of their liking”.
Sharma said the letter was prompted by a recent incident of a parent of a Class VI student in a government school in northeast Delhi’s Tukhmirpur, complaining to the area MLA that his daughter had been asked to remove her headscarf by her teacher. However, after the incident, Delhi Education Minister Manish Sisodia in a statement had clarified that there were no such restrictions given to Delhi government schools.
“After this incident earlier this week, I didn’t want any controversy on dress code to occur in our schools. Any kind of religious attire like a headscarf can develop a complex among children, as to why they are the ones who are being looked upon differently from the lot. It creates inequality among children, that too when they are so young. It is not the right thing to do,” said Sharma.
A senior SDMC official, however, said, “We have received the letter, but it is not an order unless first proposed and approved in the House and by the municipal commissioner. It has been written by the councilor in her capacity as the committee’s chairperson, but for it to be implemented, it will first have to be approved by the House.”
SDMC mayor Mukesh Suryan said what she has said is just simple to “stick to the uniform.” He further said, “What students wear to schools must be decided by the schools.”