Sambalpur: The outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc with the education of students.
Even as the government has introduced various initiatives like online education including in the YouTube mode to take care of the classroom education of students, absence of Class IX and Class X textbooks in the market has further distressed the parents and students alike.
The reason cited for the unavailability of these textbooks in the market is the changes in the curriculum, especially in Oriya and Geography.
At least 60,000 textbooks have arrived at the office of the Sambalpur branch of the Board of Secondary Education over the last three days. Despite changes in the Oriya curriculum, 6,000 Oriya textbooks have reached here.
But no Geography textbooks have arrived here as yet, said deputy secretary in-charge Kailash Chandra Behera.
Earlier, textbooks worth over Rs 1 crore were sold to dealers in Sambalpur zone. However, books worth just Rs 40 lakh to Rs 42 lakhs have been sold to dealers in the current academic year.
Books could not be sold even as there was heavy demand for books here. Only recently, supply of books to dealers has started. Sambalpur zone has nine districts and 121 dealers under it.
There are 23 dealers in Sambalpur district, 31 in Bargarh district, one in Debgarh, eight in Jharsuguda, 23 in Sundargarh, 20 in Bolangir, four each in Sonepur and Kalahandi and seven dealers in Nuapada district.
Books are supplied to these dealers as per their invoices, officials said. At present, 60,000 textbooks have reached the branch office in the first phase. These books have been equitably distributed across the nine districts in the zone. Behera said even Geography books will be made available to students without much delay.
PNN
