Rajasthan Tribal Schools Campaign: CJP Launches 'Adivasi School Theek Karo' Drive To Document Ground Reality

Jaipur: Amid the Rajasthan government's month-long campaign to light an “Aashirwad ka Diya” (lamp of blessings) in schools and colleges to mark Prime Minister Narendra Modi's birthday, the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) has announced a parallel campaign to document the condition of schools in tribal-dominated areas of the state.

CJP launches school campaign

The campaign, titled “Adivasi School Theek Karo” (Fix Tribal Schools), will begin in the Udaipur division, with a CJP team leaving for the region on Friday and expected to start visiting schools from Saturday. The organization plans to expand the campaign subsequently to other tribal areas of Rajasthan.

CJP national convener Ashutosh Ranka said the organization would also light the government-promoted lamp at tribal schools, but with the expectation that the exercise would draw attention to their basic infrastructure and facilities.

“The government has announced that an 'Aashirwad ka Diya’ will be lit in schools and colleges for a month on the occasion of the prime minister's birthday. CJP will also light the lamp in tribal area schools and hope that, through this, the government takes note of the condition of these schools,” Ranka said.

Focus on tribal school conditions

He said the campaign is the second phase of CJP's “School Theek Karo” initiative, under which the organization claims to have audited more than 15,000 schools across the country, including over 500 in Rajasthan, since its launch about a month ago.

Under the new campaign, teams will visit schools in tribal-populated areas of Udaipur, Dungarpur, Banswara, Jhalawar, Sirohi, and Baran-Anta, among other regions. The teams will document the availability of basic facilities and the ground situation in schools and colleges, Ranka said.

“The objective is not just to see the condition of schools but also to bring it before the public,” he said.

Campaign expansion plans

Ranka said the organization plans to extend the campaign beyond Rajasthan to tribal areas of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, and the northeastern states.

He said the CJP would seek the participation of locals in identifying problems related to schools and colleges. “We will raise these issues together with villagers,” Ranka said, adding that the organization wanted to focus on basic issues such as education, healthcare, roads, and employment in tribal areas.

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Concerns over basic facilities

Referring to the wider debate over public education and healthcare, Ranka said political parties have raised such issues at different times, but basic facilities continued to be lacking.

He said that nearly 80 years after independence, reports of children being forced to study in makeshift or unsuitable spaces, including near cattle sheds, warranted scrutiny. “CJP is neither going to remain silent nor stop,” he said.