School Education Saga-IV: Implementation of healthy school bag policy faces heavy odds in pvt schools

Hyderabad: Implementation of a healthy school bag policy is facing major odds when it comes to private schools in Telangana.

A healthy school bag remains a distant dream. Even after 20 years, after the Madras State High Court directed the Centre to bring a policy for a healthy school bag, and the Central legislation like the Children School Bags (Limitation on Weight) Bill, 2006, followed by the recommendations of the National Curriculum Framework (NCF) 2005, and the National Education Policy-2020 (NEP-2020) and School Bag Policy-2020, the burden of heavy school bags continues.

The Children School Bags (Limitation on Weight) Bill, 2006 envisaged providing for a limitation on the weight of school bags, duties and responsibilities of the schools to ensure the compliance of the limitations so imposed and to provide lockers in schools and to issue necessary instructions for handling and carrying of school bags by children.

The recommendations and laws in force highlight the health problems related to a heavy school bag. Speaking to The Hans India, Tribal Residential Educational Institutions Telangana Employees Association leader Mamidi Narayana said that residential school students face no burden with school bags, as they have both the school and accommodation together.

While the heavy school bags are not a burden for the government schools in the state, it is the private schools where the problem might be severe.

This needs to be addressed given the majority of students in several urban areas in Hyderabad, Ranga Reddy, Warangal, Khammam, Nalgonda, and others, stand at more than 50 per cent of the total school-attending students in those areas, he added.