A View of Saint John School- Image speaks all
Nagpur: Nagpur has seen a downpour like never-before in the last few days. We have seen what it means when the skies split and
all hell breaks lose by way of torential rains that make roads into rivers and homes and buildings into islands. Even the weather prediction is grim. ‘ Accuweather’ site predicts that heavy downpour that will begin on Thursday morning and continue till Friday evening will lead to further flooding.
What do schools who care for their students safety and well being do in such cases? Declare a holiday and and advise parents to not let their children outside ofcourse! That is what they do in Mumbai these days since that horrible flood when thousands perished. Are we waiting for such a situation to develop in our city before we get wise and learn to take precautions?
We are all seeing photos of Ambazari lake overflow gushing into Nag River really making it look like a proper huge and furious river unlike its usual sluggish flow. This river is flowing over the bridges cutting off the city’s connectivity . One local Nagpur web site reports that “office goers and school children cannot reach their destinations”.
But since schools had not declared an official holiday many conscientious parents still sent their parents to school. Some chose to drive them their themselves instead of depending on usual auto rikshas.
It was one such father who had driven his daughter to Bhawans School which is situated right by the side of the Nag river in Civill Lines saw a horrible scene. Though the roads outside were motorable the grounds of the premises were flooded and rain water from the streets was flowing into the low lying school grounds on its way to the Nag Nallah/river.
‘Water seeks its own level ‘ right? This is an elementary lesson we learn in Science. So the heavy downpour has to go somewhere! But surprisingly teachers who taught us this have forgotten Science themselves.
Thus what the father saw was a young kid, hardly 6 may be, braving the water on the ground to reach his classroom. He could not retain his balance and fell down. The ruthless force of the gushing water would have taken him to the nallah and a sure drowning and death if an auto wallah hadn’t run in and picked up the child!
Another parent watching this took out a video and shared it with us at Nagpur Today. We aired it so parents and other Nagpurians would be warned.
The video went viral and soon the school authorities became aware of it too. They then declared a holiday and advised parents to come and collect their kids from school premises. Other schools like Modern School followed suit.
View of Modern School
When our correspondent went to interview the school Principal he was denied admission within the premises and no one agreed to speak with him. The auto wallahs stationed outside did mention that lot of water was there and it appeared very unsafe but were too intimidated to say it on record. After all they make a living plying kids from this school!
When the undersigned managed to get a teacher on the phone, she was told that the video was a “prank” and mischief and that someone was trying to defame the school! This, when the school is easily visible in the video!
When will our ‘authorities’ learn that Media cannot be blamed for anything and everything? It behoves on them to take precautions too.
When there are storms and heavy rains, waters are not the only danger. Trees fall down, electric wires get damaged and there can be mayhem.
In this competitive world, are grades and academic performance the only things that matter?
What about the School Principal’s primary duty of safeguarding their children whom parents send so trustingly in their custody during school hours?
We hope Bhawans will reflect on these points rather than calling live evidence ‘fake’.
Their obdurance and carelessness could have cost a child his life today. Then it wouldn’t have mattered if the video was fake or real….the tragedy would have been very real.
