High schools open in Kashmir, students missing

Students preferred to stay away from schools even as the Jammu and Kashmir administration announced the opening of all the higher secondary schools across the Kashmir Valley after a gap of two months since the abrogation of Article 370 on August 5.

On Thursday Divisional commissioner Kashmir Baseer Ahmad Khan directed all the Deputy Commissioners of Kashmir and officials of the Education Department to open the higher secondary schools.

IANS visited prominent government higher secondary schools of Srinagar like SP Higher Secondary School, Boys Higher Secondary School Jawahar Nagar and Girls Higher Secondary School Rajbagh.

Only staff members were present but there were no students in any of these schools.

SP Higher Secondary school in Srinagar has been converted into a CRPF camp with several companies of the Central Reserve Police Force deployed there.

"There are 24 classrooms in the school, which have all been taken over by the CRPF," a teacher at the school told IANS.

Staff members were present but not the students in Higher Secondary School Jawahar Nagar with a strenth of over 1,100 students and Girls Higher Secondary school Rajbagh with over 300 students

When the state administration opened other schools last month the outcome was similar. The move drew an extremely poor response. Only the staff members showed up in the schools as most students stayed away. IANS