Nishikant Khajuria
JAMMU, Sept 12: Unprecedented heavy rains and flash floods have caused massive damage to the school buildings across Jammu division where all the educational institutions reopened today after remaining closed for a week due to the inclement weather.
More than a thousand school buildings were damaged in the nature’s fury and a number of them have virtually turned into ruins while more reports of damage are still pouring in from remote areas, official sources informed the Excelsior.
Maximum damage was caused in Poonch, Rajouri, Udhampur, Reasi and erstwhile districts of Doda where the number of fully and partially damaged school buildings is more as compared to Jammu, Kathua and Samba, said Director School Education H R Pakhroo.
In Poonch, 214 schools have been damaged, out of which 179 are partially damaged while 35 are fully damaged. Most of the fully damaged schools fall in Balakote, Mendhar, Sathra and Nangali Zones of the district. 110 Primary schools have been affected and most of them fully damaged whereas two higher secondary, three high and 99 Middle schools have suffered damages.
Similarly, in Rajouri, more than 200 school buildings were damaged. While 49 school buildings are fully damaged, 153 have suffered cracks in the heavy rains. Devastation can be gauged from the fact that three class rooms of Government Higher Secondary School Saaj got buried in mud due to flash floods, said Chief Education Officer (CEO) Rajouri Pardeep Sharma.
In Reasi district, which comprise Mahore, Gulabgarh and Arnas areas, 223 school buildings have developed cracks rendering a number of such structures unsafe for running the classes there.
In Udhampur, rains have damaged 163 schools, 22 fully and 141 partially while in Ramban district, the number of fully damaged and partially damaged schools is 27 and 73, respectively.
In Doda, 70 school building have suffered damages and 20 of them are razed to the ground leaving no scope of repair while 53 school buildings in Kishtwar were damaged. Samba, Jammu and Kathua are the least affected in this division even as the total number of partially damaged schools in these three districts is 138. However, no school building here was fully damaged while in majority of cases, the nature of damage is either collapse of boundary wall or water leakage from the roofs.
According to H R Pakhroo, Director School Education Jammu, all the concerned Chief Education Officers have been directed to ensure that studies should not suffer without compromising safety of the students. “Necessary instructions have been issued for arranging rented accommodation or tents to run the classes for the students, whose school buildings are fully damaged or unsafe,” he said.
Even as there are no reports of damage to college buildings across Jammu division, connectivity to some of these institutions has been badly affected due to flash floods and heavy rains. The link roads to the colleges in Buddhal, Kishtwar and Surankote etc have been washed away thus making it difficult for a number of students to attend the classes.
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