No student enrolled in 35 schools, 60 teachers in schools which don't have any students Govt report paints pathetic reality of schools

By Our Staff Reporter
IMPHAL, Oct 31 : A Unified District Information System for Education Plus (UDISE+) 2024-25 report published by the Union Ministry of Education Department of School Education & Literacy has revealed that 383 of the 4,666 schools in Manipur have only one teacher each, while 64.05 per cent of students from pre-primary to secondary level are enrolled in private schools and 34.65 per cent in Government and Government-aided schools.
The report comes even as the State Government had launched the School Fagathanshi campaign with an eye to improve the Government run schools across the State.
The report also comes close on the heels of a report published by The Sangai Express on October 29, which detailed how people of Teinem village in Ukhrul district had got together to hire teachers to ensure education for the young children of the village. The school in question is Tuinem High School, which had only 6 teachers three years back.
Before the people got into the act to hire teachers themselves, the drop out rate at the Government run Tuinem High School was high, a former Chairman of the village had confided.
According to the report, 6,73,118 students from pre-primary to secondary level are enrolled across various schools in the State, with 208,052 in Government schools, 25,191 in Government-aided schools, and 4,31,156 in private schools.
On school infrastructure, the report noted that 420 of the 3,894 toilet facilities for girl students and 470 of the 4,010 boys' toilet facilities are not functional.
It also said that 310 schools have no power supply despite having electricity facilities.
The Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) stands at 91.9 per cent for pre-primary to Class II, 130.9 per cent for Classes III to V, 92.8 per cent for Classes VI to VIII, and 68.7 per cent for Classes IX to XII, it said.
The report further mentioned that the GER for Scheduled Caste (SC) students is above 100 per cent, while that for Scheduled Tribe (ST) students is low at the secondary level.
The UDISE+ 2024-25 report also stated that 41,490 teachers are teaching 673,118 students across 4,666 schools in Manipur, with a pupil-teacher ratio of 16:1. On average, each school has nine teachers.
No student was enrolled at 35 schools, it said and  added that 60 teachers are employed at schools which don't have any students.
It also stated that 383 schools, with a total of 9,115 students, employ only one teacher each.
The report further noted that 60.06 per cent  of the 41,890 teachers-i.e., 24,920 teachers teach at the secondary level, while 8,705 teach from pre-primary to Class V and 7,861 teach from Class VI to VIII.
The presence of functional Integrated Teaching Learning Devices is very low in Government schools at just 2.1 per cent, while private schools have 24.4 per cent, the report added.