Delivering school textbooks on time is no doubt a success for the government. But in recent years, it has failed to deliver all new textbooks to the students on the first day of January. A similar situation is likely to arise again in the next academic year (2024). According to the media, the printing of text books for primary level students for the 2024 academic year is almost complete. But the secondary level is reportedly experiencing delays. According to the National Curriculum and Textbook Board (NCTB), around 60 million textbooks for classes VIII and IX are yet to be printed. This has raised concerns about the timely availability of these essential learning materials to the students as the new academic year approaches. What is more worrying is that the manuscript of three books of class IX have not been finalised yet.
The printing of the new textbooks should be completed by November. But it is not only unfortunate but also inexcusable that the manuscript of some books is yet to be finalised even by the second week of December. The delay in printing textbooks has created doubts over reaching the books to the students on January 1, 2014. Every year the delay in printing textbooks mainly affects the students. If the book is printed in haste, its quality goes down. The students cannot use poorly printed books even for a year. Unavailability of textbooks in time can make students rely on notes and guidebooks. This is why the authorities concerned must work hard to make quality textbooks available on time so as to enhance the quality of education as a whole.
Ashikujaman Syed,
Research Assistant,
Bioinformatics Research Lab,
Center for Research Innovation and Development (CRID).
syedashikujaman@yahoo.com