Twenty-six. That’s how many students have died in the residential schools governed by the ST and SC Development department of Odisha government since July 2024, according to a reply placed in the Assembly on Friday (March 7).
Manisha Mandangi, a Class-VI student of Ashram School in Durgapadu under Rayagada block in Rayagada district, was not one of them though. Last year on July 3, the 10-year-old developed a fever. She was put on paracetamol by hostel’s assistant superintendent Ghana Sabar and the same medication continued till July 6. The next day, as her condition deteriorated, the blood work conducted by the ASHA worker tested positive for malaria PF. Manisha was administered an anti-malaria drug.
However, on July 8, when her health continued to fall and she was unable to wake up, Sabara and cook-cum-attendant (CCA) Punagu Puala took Manisha to the district headquarters hospital (DHH). On the way, the student’s father met them and insisted she be taken home. Sabar and Puala agreed and dropped the student at her home and returned. Shortly afterwards, the assistant superintendent got a call. Manisha had passed away.
The inquiry report by the district welfare officer (DWO), accessed by The New Indian Express, pinned the assistant superintendent and the CCA for their negligence in supervision, delay in informing the head master, who, too, was on leave for two days without permission. That the student was allowed to go home during such critical illness was a gross violation of the clear set of guidelines laid out for safety, security and well-being of the 5.7 lakh boarders who reside in school hostels run by the ST & SC Development department.
Home to the third highest tribal population in India, Odisha also has one of the largest residential schooling facilities for tribal students in the country. Located in remote pockets, these residential schools run by the ST and SC Development department (also called SSD schools) have been in news for deaths and suicides, pregnancy of inmates, all pointing to gross mismanagement.
In January, Congress MLA Ramachandra Kadam first brought up the matter. Inquiry reports of 10 cases, which are in the possession of The New Indian Express, expose the poor state of affairs in these government-run hostels.
Residential Schools
The ST & SC Development department has 1,746 residential schools providing education from primary to high school level. There are around 6,700 hostels run by the department which provide residential facilities to 5.7 lakh boarders. Hostels for tribal students under School and Mass Education (SME) department are also managed by ST & SC Development department.
The government has created 3,000 matron posts in girls’ hostels and hired 336 auxiliary nursing midwives (ANMs) to look after the health of both boy and girl inmates. While the school headmasters as head of institution, look after overall management, regular teachers double up as assistant superintendents (a female teacher in case of a girls’ hostel) who are responsible for overall safety, security and mess management. All teachers serve as assistant superintendents on a monthly rotational basis. Each girls’ hostel has provision for a lady matron (immediate contact person during sickness) and a lady cook-cum-attendant (LCCA) who is responsible for cooking, dining and attending to any emergency at night.
However, there are no wardens for boys’ hostels. Apart from the assistant superintendent, there are one or more CCAs to look after emergencies at night besides cooking and dining in a boys’ hostel. The CCAs, mostly locals, are appointed in the ratio of 50:1 (1 CCA for 50 boarders). None of the hostels have security guards.
On January 28, 15 students of Sihidia primary school in Bonai sub-division of Sundargarh district ditched their hostel in the middle of the night and trekked 5 km on a road passing through dense forests before being spotted by a police patrol in the neighbouring Deogarh district’s Barkote area. The school authorities had no inkling about it for the next 12 hours. The students were in the age group of 5-11 years. It is a school under SME department but the hostel is managed by ST & SC Development department.
Violation of Provisions
For managing the large number of hostels, the department has a well-defined hostel management system which requires the hostel superintendent, assistant superintendent, matron and CCAs to look into the health and well-being of the children. Yet, when it comes to implementation, there are gaping holes.
One of the guidelines mandates that under no circumstances, any boarder should be sent back home in ailing condition. “Children in these hostels come from the most vulnerable sections of the society. Their parents send them to residential schools as they cannot bear the cost of their food, education and medical expenses. Which is why, when a child is ailing, he or she has to be provided medical care either at hospital or the hostel. But to escape the responsibility, the hostel authorities allow parents to take their ailing children back home,” said Prasanta Nayak, an education activist of Balangir. And many times, timely medical care is missing, he added.
Manisha’s not the only case where she was denied timely medical care and sent back home despite suffering from malaria.
In Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi’s home turf Keonjhar, 13-year-old Maina Ho, a Class VII residential student of Nuamalia ashram school in Ghasipura died on August 12 after suffering from bouts of vomiting for two days. The school headmaster, assistant superintendent of hostel, her local guardian and hostel cook took her to the Danagadi community health centre where she was referred to SCB Medical at Cuttack. She was brought back to school after preliminary treatment on August 11 but instead of keeping her at the hostel for better care, the headmaster allowed her parents to take her home. She died a day later after a fresh bout of vomiting.
At Koraput’s Govt Girls’ high school in Narayanpatna, a Class VII boarder Sangita Tadingi was diagnosed with malaria on August 2 last year. The girl, despite suffering from high fever, was left unattended in the hostel’s sick room for long periods twice. Only after her father came to visit her at the hostel on August 4 (a Sunday) that the ANM and assistant superintendent realised her worsening health condition and took her to Narayanpatna CHC from where she was referred to SLN Medical College and Hospital, Koraput and then to MKCG Medical College and Hospital at Berhampur. But it was too late.
Similarly, in Kuliana block of Mayurbhanj, Indrabati Murmu, a Class V boarder of Asanjoda ashram school was allowed to go home with her mother by the hostel superintendent despite suffering from chicken pox on December 9. She died four days later.
Negligence is not limited to healthcare alone. Sources said every year, the government provides Rs 15,000 to Rs 1 lakh to each school for repair and maintenance of hostels, depending on the nature of work. “In rural areas where these hostels are mostly located, only a few hostels can be found well maintained,” said Kandhamal-based educationist Kailash Chandra Dandapat.
A Class I student of Darapangia ashram school in Bhanjanagar Ridhi Pradhan, died of snake bite on July 8. Investigation revealed the hostel, which houses around 40 to 50 small tribal children of primary grades, was never cleaned properly and remained surrounded by unwanted vegetation and debris.
Likewise, when a student’s suicide was reported from Ekalavya Model Residential School at Kuarmunda in Sundargarh in December, it was found out that neither did the school nor the hostel authorities bothered to find out why the student was missing from classes for a long time. The Class VII student, who was reportedly depressed, skipped classes after the third period and went back to his hostel where he chose an abandoned kitchen room to end his life. The suicide was noticed only in the evening.
Despite being a model school, the boys were found living in pathetic conditions, the inquiry report shows. Their hostel rooms were found to be extremely dirty, the kitchen littered with pan masala packets, a smoking pipe and the hostel building replete with dumps of rotting leftover food, polythene and paper waste. “It seems that the boys have been just left to stay in the manner they wish to live in the hostel,” said the DWO report.
Complaints of poor facilities and lack of monitoring at hostels have been dime a dozen despite the government pumping in funds for students’ welfare. Last month, students of the department-run Basipitha high school in Mayurbhanj district stepped out of their hostel at midnight when its caretakers were asleep and walked 25 km to Baripada to register complaints of poor living conditions at their hostel. The CCAs came to know about the missing children only in the morning. This, despite the department’s directive on installation of CCTV cameras in the hostels. And at a residential girls’ high school in Chitrakonda of Malkangiri, a teenager’s pregnancy remained unnoticed for eight months till she delivered a premature baby in her hostel’s roof last month. What leaves many baffled is that neither the matron nor the ANM, who are in charge of monitoring girl inmates’ health, could know about it.
An Overburdened System
The department has a hostel management system in place but the onus of managing the 5.7 lakh boarders rests primarily on 6,000-odd headmasters and teachers. So does the blame when things go wrong. However, a closer examination reveals how the system has overburdened them.
Unlike neighbouring states of Chhattisgarh and Andhra Pradesh where management of SSD school hostels is entrusted to a third party, teachers and headmasters of the department look after hostels apart from academics and mid-day meals. The job becomes even more difficult owing to vacancies.
The department has sanctioned 9,235 teacher posts for its schools and close to 3,000 of them are vacant. “Besides, a large number of headmaster positions are vacant and being manned by seniormost teachers. So, the existing teachers have to not only look after academics and mid-day meals but also mess management which is extremely taxing,” said a teacher of a residential sevashram, requesting anonymity.
For the additional work of overseeing hostel management, the teachers get a paltry Rs 50 per month. “To make things worse, our salaries are way less than what our counterparts in the School and Mass Education department get. And there is no break on a Saturday or Sunday or even a holiday,” he added. Also, in most of the cases, the headmasters and teachers stay away from the hostels as quarters on the premises are dilapidated and unfit for use.
The department provides Rs 200 per boarder per annum which is used to procure first aid, medicines and meet travel expenses of sick boarders from hostel to the nearest health center and referral hospitals. “This amount is paltry for hiring an autorickshaw or private ambulance to take an ailing boarder to hospital. Government ambulances fail to reach most of the times, considering many of the hostels are located in the interior pockets. A teacher has to spend from his own pocket to meet this expense and in my two decades of career, I have never seen the expense reimbursed by the department,” said another teacher of an ashram school in Keonjhar. In the case of Manisha, she was taken on a two-wheeler to the district headquarters hospital in Rayagada.
The burden is not any less for the ANMs. Each of the 336 ANMs attached to SSD school hostels have to undertake health screening of boarders of six to seven neighbourhood SSD schools, once a fortnight and screen the students for fever, malaria, diarrhoea, respiratory infection and other health issues.
“Our workload increases every academic year but little does the department realise that it is not humanly possible to cover every school considering the difficult terrain they are located in and large number of students in hostels. Summer and monsoon seasons are particularly difficult,” said Rani Behera, an ANM who is attached to an SSD school in Koraput.
Admitting to the gross mismanagement, a senior official of the department said the problem exists because the number of students in hostels is much higher than the number of personnel deployed, teachers in particular, to man these facilities.
“Government is aware of this problem and is considering measures to put a dedicated system in place for management of SSD school hostels, be it by creating a separate cadre of officials or roping in a third party for the job,” he added.
The department had recently advertised for posting of 2,629 teachers and the Staff Selection Commission is scheduled to conduct the examination soon. The teachers are likely to be posted by June, he said. “Also, the department ensures that all the security measures in hostels are in place including its toll free number 1800 345 3040 which can be used by the students to register their complaints,” the official further added.
Attempts to get ST & SC Development minister Nityananda Gond’s response on the issues proved futile.