PCB to build new school to admit more students

PUNE: In order to admit more students, the Pune Cantonment Board (PCB) will build one more school and repair the existing eight.
The board said it would shift the students to a new building during the repair work.
PCB has been under pressure to renovate some of its buildings, including a school building in Bhimpura area, Camp, which has been lying unused and dilapidated.The Board runs five primary schools, three high schools and one learning centre for children with mental and physical disabilities- Zhep.
About 5,000 students, from under-privileged and low-income group families in the area, are enrolled in these schools.
"Veer Sawarkar School is in a bad condition and has not been used for over 15 years. If we refurbish the building, we can admit more students and take some pressure off the other schools," a senior PCB official said.
PCB has estimated the expenditure for refurbishment to about Rs 2.5 crore. "The army authorities, including garrison engineers, have scrutinized our estimates and building plans of the refurbishment and the cost has increased from the original estimate of Rs 2.29 crore. The Board has approved all estimates and we will send it back to the authorities for sanction," the official said.
The Board has also identified land near the Cantonment store yard to shift the Tagore school permanently.
The Pune Cantonment Board (PCB) is set to add one more school to the eight it already runs, and says that it is making "arrangements" to shift school children to new buildings and repair existing ones.
The PCB runs five primary schools, three high schools, and one learning centre for children with mental and physical disabilities- ZHEP. About 5000 students are enrolled in schools run by the PCB, mostly from under-privileged and low income group families in the area. It has been under to pressure to renovate some of its buildings, including one school building which has been lying unused and dilapidated, in the Bhimpura area of Camp.
"The unused school building, Veer Sawarkar School, is currently in a very bad condition and has not been used for more than 15 years now. If we refurbish the building, we can use it to admit more students, and relieve some pressure off the other schools in the area", says a senior PCB official.
The PCB says that it is spending about Rs 2.5 crores in refurbishing the school.
"The army authorities, including the garrison engineers, have scrutinized our estimates and building plans of the refurbishment, and the cost has increased slightly from the original Rs 2.29 crores that we had estimated. The Board has approved all estimates and we will send it back to the authorities for their sanction", the official adds.
The lack of alternative school buildings has also caused another headache to the PCB, that of shifting students of the Ravindranath Tagore school on Bootee Street.
"Shifting students of the Ravindranath Tagore School is absolutely necessary because of the construction of the sewage treatment plant adjacent to the school building. While new building needs to be constructed, the students have to be accommodated to other schools. As of now, we have zeroed in on the Ambedkar School near Solapur bazaar, where the students will be shifted. The two school's authorities will decide when the shifting will happen", says an education department official of the PCB.
The PCB also adds that it has identified land to shift the Tagore school permanently to, at a site near the Cantonment store yard.