Paletwa High School teachers have been collecting excess money from students for the academic year 2009 in Chin state western Burma.
“I paid Kyat 3000 as donation when I admitted my son in Paletwa High School. At that time they collected an additional Kyat 900 for furniture. So we have to pay at least Kyat 5000 for admission in one academic year,” said a pastor in Paletwa town.
The teachers made some kind of rule regarding admission fees in the higher section, middle section, and the primary section. If parents are unable to pay, their children will not be admitted to the school. This is a severe burden on students’ parents who are very poor, he added.
Paletwa town has been suffering from the effects of famine in Chin state. Most parents cannot cultivate their agricultural plots and cannot earn enough money for their livelihood. Despite such extreme conditions they cannot neglect their children’s education.
“Teachers are collecting money for sports, flower pots, brooms and other small items. Sometimes they collect money when some teachers are transferred to other schools. So expenses of a student’s parents touch between Kyat 4000 to 5000 a year. Some parents with children in school are terribly harassed. On the other hand, most parents cannot send their children to school so the number of uneducated children is increasing in Chin state,” he told Khonumthung News.
We don’t know the exact number of children who cannot attend school in Chin state as we have no data. But we can surely say that they are increasing year after year, he added.
In the neighboring Indian state of Mizoram, parents are providing education to their children as the government sees to the admission of children who are of school going age. So Mizoram state is in the second position in terms of literacy in India.
Meanwhile, under the governance of the military junta Chin people cannot take any step forward in the current educational system. It is going from bad to worse year after year, said a Chin teacher in Aizawl city, Mizoram state, India.
