Report: Action against fake teachers is not satisfactory

Lucknow: Action taken against fake teachers identified by SIT and STF during a document-verification drive in 20 districts is far below satisfactory, showed a progress report issued by the basic education department.
Districts that took measures like issuing recovery notices to sacked teachers didn’t get support from their divisional offices—a cause of major worry—as pointed out by the state project director for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan Vijay Kiran Anand in the report.
Last month, several imposters were found working in Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalayas, residential schools for girls from weaker sections, on the basis of academic records of one Anamika Shukla.
On June 15, chief minister Yogi Adityanath had ordered a statewide drive by a dedicated team to check documents of government teachers across the state. Since then, all three education departments—basic, secondary and higher—have been verifying the academic records of their teachers.
According to the report, districts where action taken was not up to the mark include Agra, Mainpuri, Ayodhya, Ambedkar Nagar, Mau, Azamgarh, Ballia, Aligarh, Kasganj, Etah, Basti, Sant Kabir Nagar, Siddharthnagar, Balrampur, Kushinagar, Baghpat, Meerut, Bulandshahr, Bijnor and Rampur.
A quick review of KGBVs showed that in 21 districts—Prayagraj, Rae Bareli, Aligarh, Mathura, Meerut and Unnao to name a few—many posts were vacant. The enrolment of girls in KGBVs in as many as 56 districts was reported not satisfactory. Directions have been issued to BSAs and district coordinators (girls’ education) in these districts. In KGBVs in 29 districts, only 50% teachers are attending school.
The report, based on video interaction and feedback from assistant directors (basic education) on various departmental schemes and activities, found that over 60% schools in 25 districts have not started any work under Operation Kayakalp, a mission by the Yogi-led government to improve infrastructure in government schools.
Gorakhpur, Amethi, Kanpur, and Lucknow are among them.
The pace of work under Operation Kayakalp was reported absolutely unsatisfactory in 12 districts, including Prayagraj, Gorakhpur, Gonda and Agra. The Centre in 2017 had issued a National School Safety Policy but in UP no monitoring was done at divisional level into the work by districts.