PANAJI:
The chief minister stated this grant seeks to compensate those schools imparting education in mother tongue who faced difficulties in accessing the one time initial special grant of Rs 12 lakh and Rs 1 lakh per annum annoucned by the government towards development of infrasturture and building resources.
“One of the common problems that the schools faced was providing of ownership documents as most schools are being run in rented premises, while some are constructed on communidade land. Till the ownership documents are submitted, grants could not be released”, informed an official.Speaking to The Goan, Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar said, “The grants will help in creating necessary infrastructure in schools. The grants will mainly be given to aided primary schools in Marathi and Konkani as we only provide salary grants to them. As regards government primary schools are concerned, all the required infrastructure is created by the State Government.”
Earlier, 30 Konkani/Marathi medium primary schools had applied for the grants after which the Directorate of Education had written back to them asking them to send details of the schools as per the format prescribed to release the one-time grant. Only two schools had responded to the request.
Education Department had asked for documents like “ copy of certificate of registration and renewal of society, approval copy of school managing committee, copy of resolution passed by the school managing committee stating that finance is required for renovation/construction of a new building/compound wall/purchase of land/development of playground, etc; documents with clear title of land where the construction/renovation is to be done along with purchase document; certified copy of cost/estimate by registered engineer/chartered accountant; approved copy of the plan by the Town and Country Planning Department and construction licence from competent authority.
“But as announced in the budget now, this special grant of Rs 400 per student per month can be utilised to create infrastructure, buy teaching aid, etc,” said the official.
