School Transport To Operate As Usual: Admin

SRINAGAR- The Jammu and Kashmir administration Tuesday said that school transport will operate as usual from March 01 when schools reopen across Kashmir division.

Incharge Divisional Commissioner Kashmir, Dr Shahid Iqbal Choudhary chaired a meeting with representatives of private schools associations in which concerns surrounding operation of school transport were discussed in detail.

Speaking during the meeting in which Director School Education Mohammad Younis Malik was also present, Dr Shahid said the government understands the concerns surrounding school transport charges and assured that these will be addressed and resolved in a manner that suits both parties.

He said the students cannot be denied the transport service while concerns surrounding the matter are to be resolved which he assured will be done soon.

Director School Education while speaking informed the meeting that the fee fixation and regulation committee of the government is assessing the matter and assured that concerns of private schools surrounding transport fee structure will be resolved soon.

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Representatives of associations of parents of school children were also present in the meeting. While taking note of their concerns, Dr Shahid assured them that school transport will remain available as usual as schools in Kashmir reopen from March 1.

Regional Transport Officer Kashmir Akramullah Tak and Additional Deputy Commissioner Srinagar Mohammad Haneef Balkhi were also present in the meeting.

Meanwhile, schools in Kashmir division will reopen for the first time after the outbreak of COVID-19 in March 2020.

Earlier, Private Schools Association of Jammu and Kashmir (PSAJK) had said that due to the increased financial burden, all the schools have unanimously decided not to ply their buses.

The Association said that the all the schools in Kashmir are under financial distress due to the situation of last two years. “Our schools have not received majority of fee and regarding transport charges we have had zero collections. On the other hand we continue to pay taxes and incur expenses on maintaining the transport fleet against zero income. This has turned our entire transport sector unviable to operate,” said G N Var president PSAJK. “In such a situation there has been a unanimous decision by all the private educational institutes that they won’t be able to provide the transport facilities to its students.”

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