Kathmandu, March 23

The Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration has issued a circular to all 753 local levels, requesting them to credit necessary amount to the bank account of the concerned community schools for the purchase and distribution of textbooks.

According to Decentralisation Section at the MoFAGA, the budget under the heading of school education has already been allocated to the local levels as per the policy of providing textbooks of Grade I to X to the students free of cost.

Earlier, the Ministry of Education and Janak Education Material Centre Ltd had written to the MoFAGA, urging it to ensure that all the printed textbooks were sold and distributed to the students, read the circular issued by the MoFAGA yesterday.

“As necessary budget has already been allocated to all local levels for the purchase and distribution of textbooks to students of community schools, you are requested to deposit the prescribed amount to the bank account of the concerned schools for the purchase of distribution of textbooks before the start of the new academic session,” it added.

Local levels have also been told to monitor schools to ascertain whether or not the students are deprived of textbooks.

The responsibility of operating and managing basic and secondary education falls on the local government as per the constitution and the federal structure of governance.

New academic session has already started in five districts — Manang, Mustang, Humla, Jumla and Dolpa, while it will start in 70 districts from April 14.

According to the Department of Education, over 35,736,726, textbooks are required for students of Grade I to X. Of them, private publication houses will be publishing 16,528,070 textbooks for Grade I to V, while JEMC will have to print as many as 19,239,656 textbooks for Grade VI to X.

The Local Government Operation Act, 2017 and Schedule-8 of the constitution has vested the powers to manage basic and secondary level education in the local levels. It includes providing remuneration of teachers and staff, distributing free textbooks to the students, issuing school operation licence, and upgrading and monitoring schools.