By Tenzin Dharpo
DHARAMSHALA, Sept. 21: Himachal Pradesh Urban Development Minister Suresh Bhardwaj has written to leaders in the capital including BJP National President JP Nadda, Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and Union sports minister Anurag Thakur urging not to hand over central Tibetan schools to an NGO overseen by the CTA and allocate the facilities under the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan.
The development comes as the Central Tibetan administration (CTA), also known as the exile Tibetan government and the Indian government are in the process of handing over six remaining schools under the Central Tibetan School Administration (CTSA) to Sambhota Tibetan School Society (STSS) that is overseen by the CTA.
In the letter, Bhardwaj said that the overwhelming majority of the student in those schools are Indian and that Tibetan students constitute a very small percentage. “Tibetans are running their own administered schools in the areas where they can accommodate their students, whereas the Indian students have no other option but to drop out from the schools if these schools are handed over to the Tibetan NGO,” Bhardwaj said. The minister’s letter is preceded by local opposition in Shimla over the handover of CST Shimla school.
The minister added that a decision was taken in 2013 to hand over all Central Tibetan Schools to Sambhota Tibetan Schools Society based in Dharamshala. The Indian government reportedly directed CTA in May to undergo administration change by 31st March, 2022.
Earlier this month, CTA President Penpa Tsering visited the schools during an official tour and took stock of the facilities that were to be transferred under STSS. CST Mussoorie, CST Shimla, CST Dalhousie, CST Kalimpong, CST Darjeeling and CST Herbertpur are the respective learning institutes that are soon expected to undergo transition from Indian government to the jurisdiction of the CTA.
According to CTA, a total of 55 Tibetan schools comprising 33 primary schools, 9 secondary schools, 5 senior secondary schools, and 8 K-12 schools have successfully been transferred from the CTSA to STSS overseen by the CTA’s education department since 2013.
With the talks of takeover underway, education department’s Secretary Jigme Namgyal earlier told Phayul that the enrolled students in those schools won’t be affected, “The transition won’t affect the students already enrolled and the curriculum will remain the same as per the CBSE guidelines. We will only provide better resources and facilities in the concerned schools.”
4 Responses
The Central Schools need to run & run very effectively in coming days also. Yet, the recent experience is not speaking of the same. Previous Kashag’s short sighted decision in bringing these school under CTA, Dharamsala has proved mess and need corrections. The Central Schools already handed over to Sambhota Society have been run very casually. The so called authorities in DoE, Sambhota and school heads lack expertise in education, experience & the minimum degrees to run these schools. Their attitude toward the education of Tibetans is abysmal. Almost all the teachers and other staff members are made to work on contractual basis when the grant of Government of India is in crore of rupees. Their benefits were never given priority and thus many left in between, which effect the students. The infrastructure of the handed over schools are in bad shapes but the authorities never see this their priority. Their priority is in advertising the happenings in the schools however small it may be to seek publicity. If the new Kashag really want to improve the conditions of these schools when Government of India is granting crores of rupees in expenses, these points may help. 1. Appoint qualified officers in head quarter & schools, teachers and other members of staff. 2. Make them permanent by allowing salary perk of Central Schools with the pension and other benefits 3. Improve infrastructure to get the best education 4. Make rule of law effective in running these schools 5. Rope in NGOs and donors & tie them up with schools to improve upon 6. Give individual schools to decide their improvement road map 7. Stop interference in any form in schools.
I am one of the former students of Central School for Tibetan, Shimla who enrolled in the early 70’s and left school with the frustration of hearing curses like ” Sale Kutoon, Bharat Sarkar ka khoon chusni wale, Jawo tum lok sadak me kamkarne yaha kya karrne ayi hea. Sweeter Bejo or hamre sir pe khrokho” almost from majority of Indian teachers and learn nothing due to excessive verbal and physical abuse. Nothing proper education we received but all these shit every day. There were very few wonderful Indian teachers, and only lucky student would get opportunity with them once out of their school years. The teachers formed union and spread message to all over India where there are Tibetan schools ran under the Central government of India’s administration that Indian teachers should not give proper education to Tibetan children because they are burden on the expense of India (our money). Tibetan students like us who depend their education on the expense of Indian government between 70’s to late 90’s were the most unfortunate groups. Gradually, TCV became popular in Tibetan community because it was run by Tibetans and students receive proper education. Tibetan parents looked forward to enroll their kids in the TCV and it has affected student enrollment in the Central School for Tibetans. Simultaneously, Sherig built its own school whereas Central government of India thought of handing over all Tibetan schools funded by India for better administration and proper education. Central School for Tibetan is originally sponsored for Tibetan refugees by the government of India but did not run properly by school principals and teachers which caused reduction of Tibetan student enrollment. As more and more Indian student joined, the curses are not much to hear because Indian teachers would not hate their blood. The school land is bought by His Holiness in the early sixty, the property is kind of abandoned due to history of evil spirits. If the HP minister objects handing over school, the CTA should better close the school and returned the property to His Holiness. I lived in the Central School for Tibetan, Shimla, 8 years and according to my experience, the State government of HP has not spent even one cent for this school and hence Minister has concern over the school or the property. HP is the State where His Holiness lived for more than six decades but Tibetan refugees bought lands to survive either through registered Tibetan non-profit organization or with the help of Tibetan ethnic background. No land was granted free as Tibetans living in South Indian States. My generation’s childhood was jeopardized by the Indian teacher’s hate politic and now handover shouldn’t be obstructed with the similar politic.
President Mr Penpa Tsering Failure, it’s his responsibility to officially convince the minister Suresh Bardwaj that the “enrolled students in those schools won’t be affected, “The transition won’t affect the students already enrolled and the curriculum will remain the same as per the CBSE guidelines. We will only provide better resources and facilities in the concerned schools.”
Mr Lobsang Sangay was able to convince concerns officers and so far able to transfer the totall number of 55 school from CTSA to STSS, if he is still our president I think the minister suresh decision would be different. Differences between president power.
I hope the elected Tibetan exiled President of CTA, Penpa Tsering la will handle the issue very carefully without any rashness considering the long term interest of Tibetans under CTA. I still consider him not legally the CTA PM because of deliberately taking his solemn oath from the Tibetan justice commissioner who had acknowledged the legal firing by Tibetan parliament in-exile members by two third majority mandated votes cast.
Therefore whatever the decision he takes about the five senior secondary school still managed by CTSA, awaiting to be handed over to STSS under CTA not later than by March 31, 2022, in the light of HP urban development minister letter to the higher level leadership at the Centre, urging not to transfer, must not and will not be his personal decision but should be brought into the discussion in TPIE despite having a good consultation among the respective kalons ( though not appointed yet due to our CTA exiled charter crisis due to the absence of three democratic pillars). As he said publicly in the past during his last year that we should be governed by rule of law but not by despotism but sadly he had allowed himself going contrary against his own statement. But anyway, he should take full accountability thereby making sure that he puts his every effort and time to help restore our full functioning of our democratic system through every possible option under his leadership. And if he continues to involve in tourist like activities without focusing on the highest level priority tasks as mentioned he will be solely responsible for the complete collapse of democratic government of CTA which was bestowed by HH the 14th DL and the repercussion for the future struggle of free Tibet or Umayyad Lam could be hugely disastrous which any patriotic Tibetan and freedom loving people towards the cause of Tibet including mainly the Tibetans still living under the oppressive CCP regime really don’t want to see such bad things happening in near future. If he can’t perform his leadership duties he should better resign ( by listening gently about the majority Tibetans losing trust of his leadership) before things get worse from worst, by thinking for the larger interest of Tibetan cause or else, he should be impeached by TPIE. At end, every Tibetan has the right to freely express one’s concern towards our cause under the bad leadership and everyone must be united so as to save the democratic governance of CTA by not waiting too long until it gets collapsed once and forever. Three legally terminated Tibetan justice commissioners should better resign immediately or else, they will be also involved together for the eventual collapse of CTA in not too far distant, should every option option fails!