While announcing that all schools in the Capital will remain closed until further notice keeping the Covid-19 situation in mind, deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Thursday said that school students graduating this year will have more opportunities as the government has added around 1,330 seats in the state’s higher educational institutes.
“Keeping the pandemic in mind, several parents and teachers have suggested that schools should not be reopened anytime soon because even if 200-400 students start coming to schools, there is a risk of Covid-19 spreading among children. Reports suggest that wherever schools were reopened, an increase in the number of cases was observed in those countries. The chief minister [Arvind Kejriwal] and I have thought this through even as parents and whether we would be willing to expose our kids to such a risk. This is why we have decided that all schools in the national Capital will remain closed until further orders,” he said.
Following the nationwide lockdown imposed in March to curb the spread of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19), schools in the national capital – government, private, government-aided, unaided and corporation schools – had stopped conducting physical classes.
Schools have moved to an online or semi-online model of teaching-learning, with classes being conducted through video conferencing applications or by sending worksheets to students who do not have unlimited access to the Internet or to devices like smartphones and laptops.
The deputy chief minister also said that the new seats will be available across various courses, including Bachelor of Arts (BA), Bachelor of Technology (BTech), Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) in the state government’s Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, which has over affiliated 130 colleges.
While the addition to the number of seats has been made mainly in undergraduate courses, seats in certain postgraduate courses like Masters in Business Administration (MBA), Master of Vocation (MVoc) and Master of Science (MSc) courses have also been increased.
“For those students who have graduated this year and will be seeking admission to colleges, this is good news that the Delhi government has added over 1,330 seats in higher education. These seats will be there in IP university colleges. Around 630 seats have been added to the BTech courses, while 220 and 120 seats have been added to BCom and BBA courses respectively,” Sisodia said during a press conference on Thursday. Around 90 and 120 seats have been added to the Bachelor in Computer Application course and BA (Honours) in Economics courses while 60 seats have been added to the MBA course as well.
Sisodia, who holds the education portfolio, claimed that the increase in seats was equivalent to opening five-six new colleges. “Past trends suggest that whenever a new college is started anywhere in the country or in the Capital, the number of seats increases by 200-300. If 1,300 seats are being added in higher education institutes this year, the increase in the number of seats is similar to starting five to six new colleges,” he said.
