Himachal Pradesh has witnessed a decline in enrolment of students in government primary schools, which has dropped from 1,30,466 in 2002-2003 to 49,295 in 2023-24.

This was disclosed by Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh here on Tuesday¸ while presiding over a meeting of senior officers of the Education department.

Sukhu said that the state government was laying special focus on providing quality education to the students in government educational institutions.

There were 89 government primary schools and 10 government middle schools currently having zero enrolment students in the state, he added.

He said that 701 primary schools had student’s enrolment of less than five, out of which 287 schools were located within the radius of two kilometers of another school whereas an additional 109 schools had a strength of only five students.

Furthermore, 46 middle schools were within the radius of three kilometers, whereas 18 additional schools had only five students, he added.

Keeping in view of the current enrolment of students, he said that it was essential to rationalize the functioning of schools.

He directed the Education department to explore the possibilities of merging the schools having low enrolments.

“This step would not only ensure adequate staff in the schools, but also pave the way for providing quality education to the students studying in the government schools.” said the Chief Minister.

He further said that the government was setting up Rajiv Gandhi Day Boarding Schools in each Assembly constituency in a phased manner which would ensure quality education and holistic development of the students to make them confident citizens of the nation.

He said that two fully equipped boarding schools would be established in tribal areas of Kinnaur and Spiti to provide better education facilities to the students.

He directed the department to identify suitable land to set up these boarding schools in the respective areas

Sukhu said that in order to ensure better resource mobilization of the schools, the government has formed clusters and an option has been given to the school management to select the smart uniform for the students of their choice.

He said that the present state government had introduced many innovative initiatives to enhance the standards in the government institutions English medium had also been implemented from first class in all the government schools.