Teachers of Majhigacha Government Primary School in no. 3 Bitara union under Kochua upazila are giving lessons to their students at the local Union Parishad Bhavan instead of inside the school building. In 2015, the school building was declared “dangerous and abandoned” by the education department.

The teachers then started to hold classes under the open sky. But observing the sorry state of the students, local UP chairman Ishaque Shikder and the school managing committee decided to shift the school temporarily to the first floor of the adjacent Union Parishad Bhavan till a new building is built by the government.

Only three rooms on the first floor of the Bhavan can hardly accommodate all the classes and students. The teachers do not have their own room.

There are 178 students and five teachers in the school.

Headmaster Mohammad Fakhrul Islam said: “We're facing huge difficulties. Teachers and students have been facing serious space crunch. I don’t know when the new building will be built.”

School managing committee president Md Halim Patwary told this correspondent: “We've appealed to the higher authorities through the local lawmaker and former home minister Dr Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir. But nothing has been done yet.”

Kochua upazila education officer Shah Md Iqbal Mansur said: “We've informed the higher authorities about the state of the school along with 37 other dilapidated government primary schools in this upazila early last year. We hope to get some positive news soon.”

According to sources in the primary education office of the district, there are a total of 207 abandoned and dilapidated government primary schools in the eight upazilas of the district.

When contacted, district primary education officer Md Khorshed Alam said he had informed the higher authorities about the poor condition of these school buildings a year ago. “But the authorities have not responded yet,” he added.