DEO clears payment before construction of school structures

Bajura, March 13

It has come to light that Bajura District Education Office has cleared the payment to as many as seven schools before completion of the construction of the schools’ structures in the district.

The DEO has cleared payment to Kanda Bhawani Higher Secondary School, Trishakti HS School, Swamikartik HS School, Ratna HS School, Pashupati HS School, Toli Devaldanda School and Dasharath HS School, of the district so far.

Each school was provided with Rs 2.4 million for the construction of structures.

Umesh Regmi, technical assistant at the DEO, said the office had cleared all bills, despite the schools’ failure to complete the construction as per the contract.

The schools were supposed to complete construction within two years in order to receive one million rupees in the first year and Rs 1.4 million in the second year through the DEO.

“As all the schools had completed enough the construction required for the first year, we paid the budget for the second year as well.

However, not a single school has met the second year’s target as of yet,” said Regmi.

Trishakti HS School started construction of its structure in 2012. Though the construction was supposed to be completed in 2013, it remains incomplete.

One of the teachers at the school, requesting anonymity, said they had failed to complete the construction due to gross negligence on the part of the School Management Committee. “No authority monitored the progress.

Hence, the project has been left in a lurch,” the teacher said.

Similarly, though Ratna and Pashupati HS schools were supposed to finish their construction before 2014, the schools’ structures are yet to be completed.

The construction of Kanda Bhawani HS School, Swamikartik HS School, Toli Devaldanda School and Dasharath HS School were supposed to be complete within 2015, but they were not.

The locals have been agitating, accusing the SMC of being involved in financial irregularities.

As the schools did not keep their promises and were involved in financial irregularities, Bajura DEO has not extended any programme to these school in the current fiscal. The office said they had blacklisted the schools.

Meanwhile, Principal of Kanda Bhawani HS School Shankar Sah said they could not meet the construction target due to negligence on the part of the SMC.

However, the school’s SMC chair Dan Bahadur Rokaya, said their construction project was left in limbo for want of necessary budget.

The chairpersons of local SMCs comprise district leaders, along with party activists of Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and UCPN-Maoist.