Primary and secondary schools run in tribal areas are by-and-large a neglected topic in our everyday discourse. In 2016, there were 557 recorded child (under the age of 5) deaths in the Palghar district alone. Further, there are deep-rooted health issues among tribal school children across Maharashtra. Most tribal children go to residential schools or ashram shalas opened in tribal-dominated regions, for providing education and free meals to children. These schools are supposed to give drinking water, food, health and toilet facilities, but seem to have miserably failed in serving their purpose.
The Present Scenario – Issues Involved
There are just over a thousand tribal residential schools in Maharashtra – half of them state-run while others funded by the state government. According to the high-level probe by the Salunkhe Committee in October last year, a large number of deaths have occurred over the last 15 years in the state-run tribal residential schools. “In 67 percent cases, there was no proper mention of the cause of death in the death certificates,” the report noted. Vague descriptions like “severe illness” and “sudden death” dominated the ‘cause of death’ column while malnutrition, lack of medical help, negligence were other reasons, This casts serious aspersions on the healthcare, hygiene and sanitation facilities available in these schools across Maharashtra.
In August 2015, Tata Institute for Social Sciences (TISS) submitted a comprehensive report to the current ruling dispensation after examining 1,076 schools, in which it came up with some embarrassing and eye-opening findings regarding healthcare and sanitation facilities at the ashram shalas.
Only 50 percent of the schools actually had a first aid kit. Around 54 percent of the aided schools and 61 percent of the government-run schools provided sanitary napkins, while others did not even do that. TISS also noted that merely 29 percent aided and 20 percent government residential schools had good drainage facilities. This further magnifies the chances of vector-borne diseases like malaria, dengue, etc. among the school children.
The actual ground situation is much worse. For instance, in case of an emergency, most of the schools would be debilitated, as trained doctors to offer immediate treatment are scarce. The Primary Health Centre is 20-30 kilometres away from the schools, on an average. Many of the health centres that are planned and budgeted for don’t see the light of day. This is due to lack of trained doctors, corruption and many other factors. Due of these critical medical inadequacies, preventive health measures seldom transpire resulting in health emergencies that could have well been avoided.
The Persistent Issue – Quality of Food and State of Kitchens
The students residing in the residential tribal schools are dependent on the free meals provided at the school. They have to survive on a fixed meal every day. On a given day, the students are served a handful (literally) of rice, along with one roti and vegetables. When students ask for more food, their request is usually turned down. During my visits to the tribal school in Walwanda village in Jawhar, overhearing the children asking each other for leftover food to pacify their hunger is a routine affair. Delving deeper into the issue, I found that the students were being served just about half the amount of rice they were supposed to get at a time. In addition to this, another pressing issue related to food is meal timing. The gap between the meals is still 14-15 hours. Students eat dinner around 5pm or 6pm and have breakfast the next day around 10am. Further, the TISS report also noted that out of all the schools across Maharashtra, merely 6 percent aided and 3.6 percent of the government tribal schools served breakfast according to the menu. Further, one-third of the schools have their gas facility and utensils in good conditions but the kitchens were unhygienic.
In June 2015, the Chief Minister of Maharashtra – Mr. Devendra Fadnavis had pronounced there would be no compromise on the quality of food served to the tribal children. To avoid the monotony of khichdi, the state had planned “nutritious meals” that would include roti, pulao, mixed vegetables, while fruits, eggs, poha and upma would be served for breakfast.
Post announcement, a pilot project of central kitchens was launched in Palghar district at that time, and it was supposed to be replicated throughout the state covering over 5 lakh tribal students by December 2015.
More than two years down the line, the socio-economic change seems to be far from achieved, with only a handful of schools being covered by the central kitchens. Reports suggest that the quality of food is relatively better wherever they have central kitchens serving food to a select number of tribal schools. But majority of the schools receive ration and food is cooked at the school premises. The vegetables are rotten, pulses are adulterated. There is no attempt to monitor much less maintain the quality of the food served.
Furthermore, an informal interaction with the Principal and school teachers as well as the non-teaching staff of the Walwanda village tribal school revealed that for every student, the aided school gets approximately INR 1,000 per month and government schools get INR 2,500 per month. This is an abysmally low amount, making it impossible to serve two square meals and breakfast.
It has been over five decades since the establishment of residential schools for tribal students in Maharashtra. Even after all these years, it turns out that the tribal school children cannot even take the basic necessities for granted. The whole tribal department runs on contractors, where contracts of crores of rupees are given for various purchases (sometimes even without tenders!), in which there is rampant corruption. There are many such alarming incidents that have occurred and reported by the media and many other unreported tragedies occur regularly on a smaller scale in all parts the country that needs attention.
Other Critical Issues – Health & Education
Various other problems exist in the tribal schools. Tribal school children don’t get good quality food. They have to sleep on the ground (no mattresses are available). Children from the tribal regions go to ashram shalas for food and education. But there is no check on the quality of food and education provided here. Since these schools are located in forest areas and on mountains, they lack proper medical facilities. So, children die not only due to malnutrition but also because of lack of treatment facilities for both communicable and non-communicable diseases such as malaria, dengue, snake bites and other fatal (yet preventable) diseases among others.
An ashram shala is running for the sake of education. No denying, education is also poor here. But not all tribal-dominated states are running the schools in a deplorable condition. Residential schools in Odisha, Jharkhand and South India have improved over the years. According to surveys conducted, children there were quite satisfied with what they were getting. Schools in Odisha, Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh are trying to improve the basic infrastructure, whereas Maharashtra lags far behind.
Conclusion
In October 2016, when Dr. Salunkhe submitted his committee’s detailed probe into the deaths at tribal schools in Maharashtra, it cited “malnutrition” as one of the major causes.
When the most essential and fundamental requirement for survival, that is, food, asserted on the whims and fancies of the state, it is a fair reflection on the holistic conditions the tribal students across the state are subjected to. Having said that, I believe that the students do not protest as fiercely or frequently over food because they are not aware of their entitlements, and their needs are indeed innocently basic.
However, back in Walwanda, there is some encouraging news to share. Ever since I have started working in the tribal school, the quantity of rice has increased a tad and they have also started serving non-vegetarian food once a month along with eggs and fruits!
Ankur Chhabra 