CURRENT NEWS I, Feb 2007

A study by SAM exposes horrible conditions of Govt. Hostels for Dalit Students in Kanchipuram District, Tamil Nadu, India

The Tamil Nadu Govt. through its Adi Dravida Welfare Department, runs 39 hostels in Kanchipuram district for Dalit high school students. There are 385 Dalit girls and 1559 Dalit boys staying in these hostels and studying in nearby govt. run high schools.

In early February 2007, we received a complaint from three students of one such hostel at Walajabad, (near Kanchipuram) that they were being forced by their hostel warden to graze his cattle and do many other menial jobs for him.

We took the matter to the District Collector who ordered an enquiry but nothing came off it, as the wardens met him and complained against us saying that we were an anti-social group.

And so, we formed a fact-finding team with well-qualified personnel and studied closely the conditions of 10 such hostels in Kanchipuram district and found that the conditions were really terrible and the wardens were most callous and irresponsible in discharging their duties.

The fact-finding team members were:

1. Mr. Rama Prabhu, Project officer, Social Action Movement.
2. Mr.T. Raj, Coordinator, Social Action Movement.
3. Ms. Indira, State Coordinator, Tamilnadu Child Rights Protection
   Federation
4. Ms. Kavitha Muralidharan, Journalist from `The Week’ national weekly.
   Ms. Kutti Revathi, Writer.
5. Mr. Charles, Advocate, Madras High Court.
6. Mr. Devaraj, EXCO member, Social Action Movement.

The following are the Recommendations of the fact-finding team, which were submitted to the govt. and released to the media.

1. Awareness should be created about facilities students are entitled to. There should be black boards in every hostel with details like the no. of soaps and oil allowed for a student, food items and other facilities.

2. There should be black boards which explain the motives of the Adi Dravidar Hostels and why the students are entitled to such facilities.

3. A student should be appointed as a leader to supervise whether the facilities are being given properly.

4. Only one warden should be appointed for one hostel. Making a warden in charge of two or three hostels make them irresponsible.

5. The teachers are relieved from this post and appointed as Adi Dravidar hostel wardens. Since they could not identify with the jobs, unemployed youth can be appointed as wardens.

6. Camps on social awareness, child rights and social justice should be held for wardens.

7. A team should be set up to examine whether the wardens do their work properly. The team should visit the hostel atleast once in a month. Wardens' duties should be defined.

8. Social crimes like drinking in hostels should be prevented

9. The president of Parents Teachers Association should be the president for only one school.

10. Though there is a rule that the president of the Parents Teachers Association should be a parent of a student, it is not being implemented properly. The government should ensure that the rule is strictly followed.

11. Warden should be made responsible for the safety of the students and should stay with the students at nights.

12. Since hygiene is not well maintained, students suffer from various ailments. Mosquitoes and bugs bite them, leading to diseases. This should be taken into consideration.

13. In women's hostel near Collector’s office, the warden has used iron seals to keep the windows closed. This kind of attitude should be abandoned. Students should not be punished when they do not make mistakes. Wardens should be sympathetic to students.

14. The mistakes done by the students should be represented to a team specially formed for the purpose. The wardens should not punish the students, beat or abuse them.

15. The project welfare officer should inspect the registers and the reasons for leave taken by students. Also, students leaving hostels without proper reasons and other irregularities should be closely monitored.

16. The government should grant monetary allowance for cleaning toilets and bathrooms. Students should not be forced to clean toilets and bathrooms.

17, Students are forced to do works in hostels. This should be seen as child labour and child rights violation. The wardens and hostel staff who indulge in such crimes should be punished.

18. Hostels should be provided library and tuition facilities

19. Infrastructure should be strengthened. Playthings, chairs, tables, fans and tube lights should be provided to students.

20. Wardens should follow the educational track record of the students and should be in touch with school teachers for the same.

21. The monetary allowance of Rs 10 per student for food should be increased.

22. Computers and televisions should be provided. Students should be given training in computer education.

23. Sports meets and cultural meets between hostels can be held at district level.

The media gave wide coverage to the study report. All newspapers and television channels gave coverage to the news. The Student Federation of India (SFI) has since taken up the issue and we hope some positive action will be taken by the Government soon.

Here is the report that appeared in THE HINDU, dated February 22, 2007

CURRENT NEWS II, Feb 2007