For decades, children started their new school year with the smell of freshly printed textbooks, but it may not happen for all pre-primary and secondary students this year. Printers of the free textbooks and officials concerned said the government would be able to give almost all primary students new textbooks on January 1 but delivery to pre-primary and secondary students have become uncertain. As of Monday, about 98 percent of 9.98 crore primary textbooks for the 2022 academic year have reached the upazilas. But half of the 24.71 crore secondary textbooks are yet to reach the upazilas and work orders for printing 66 lakh textbooks for pre-primary students were yet to be issued.
Usually, the NCTB is able to send around 95 percent of the textbooks to the upazilas by mid-December. Delays in the tender process, issuance of work orders, and other necessary works related to printing of pre-primary and secondary textbooks have created this uncertainty. NCTB said the matter of delivering the pre-primary books is not a concern as these books are not given to students to take home. They are usually kept at schools. NCTB needs to float fresh tenders for printing pre-primary textbooks as there were some issues with papers for textbooks due to the pandemic.
The government is set to distribute over 34.70 crore textbooks to over 4.17 crore pre-primary, primary and secondary students. The delivery of almost all textbooks to students on New Year’s Day has been successful since 2010. The government distributed 365.84 crore free textbooks between 2010 and 2021, earning praise at home and abroad. The distribution of free textbooks has led to significant improvements in enrolment at primary and secondary levels, as well as decrease in dropouts. The textbook festival attracts kids to schools. This should not be set upside-down for the irresponsibility of some officials and printers.
