For many students in rural districts, this year’s new academic session began just like those in the preceding years as schools in Rautahat, Bara, Parsa, Makwanpur, Chitwan, Gulmi, Arghakanchi, Palpa, Kapilvastu, Rupandehi and Nawalparasi are still without full sets of textbooks. 

Chief of Janak Education Materials Centre (JEMC) store in Chitwan Mohan Krishna Shrestha lamented that they were unable to supply complete sets of textbooks according to demands in several districts. “We have only supplied 50 percent of books from the store,” he said.

The demand of textbooks for grades eight, nine and 10 is high across the country. District Education Officer of Syangja Baburam Sapkota said they had received incomplete set of textbooks. “We are facing problems in textbooks distribution as the JEMC delivered incomplete sets of books,” he said. 

Nearly 85 percent of students have received textbooks in Palpa district. However, students of grades eight, nine and 10 are still without complete set of textbooks, Palpa District Education Office said.

Students in the far-western districts are also facing the shortage of books. The JEMC store in Dhangadhi said they still need 450,000 textbooks for distribution in the districts. 

Chief of the JEMC Dhangadhi store Yogendra Prasad Bhatta said they have distributed only 1.35 million textbooks in nine districts of the Far-West. “We will distribute the remaining books after the centre supplies them,” said Bhatta, adding that textbooks of mainly secondary and lower secondary grades were not coming in complete set. 

The textbooks have not reached the remote villages of Darchula district. District Education Officer Baburam Dhungana said they were facing problems in transporting books due to difficult terrain. “There’s no shortage of books and we have been inspecting the schools in the district,” he clarified.

In Rolpa, only 50 percent of students have received textbooks. The government has directed the District Education Offices to distribute the textbooks in the community schools within April 27. 

Meanwhile, schools in the eastern part of Taplejung have yet to begin their classes. Although the schools in eastern Khebang, Yamphudin and Surumakhim VDCs remain closed, textbooks have been brought on mules into those VDCs. The Kanchanjunga Secondary School Manage- ment Committee said regular classes in the school will start from April 27. “Teachers, who are away on leave, will return soon,” he said. 

(With inputs from our local correspondents)