Schools, colleges will reopen after August 15: HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal

New Delhi: The schools and colleges, which have remained closed in view of COVID19 pandemic, will reopen only after August this year, said Union HRD Minister Ramesh Nishank Pokhriyal in an interview recently.

The educational institutes in the country have remained closed since around March 16.

According to a report, there are around 33 crore students, who are waiting to know the date of the reopening of their educational institutes.

While many of the schools and colleges have started online classes, most of the students have failed to avail benefits of such classes due to lack of proper internet connections, desktops, laptops, or smartphones.

It was earlier expected that the schools and colleges would reopen in the month of July with attendance of 30% of students.

It was also earlier stated that educational institutes would reopen shift-wise with smaller attendance and maintaining social distancing norms in Green and Orange zones.

However, as there has been no improvement in the COVID19 situation in the country, the Union HRD Ministry within a week announced that no decision was finalized on the reopening of the educational institutes.

A media report said clearing doubts of the students, parents, and teachers, the HRD Minister in an interview said schools and colleges would be reopened only after August 15 this year.

The report quoted Pokhriyal as saying: “We are trying to get declared all the results from the examinations this session by August 15.”

“This means those exams which have already taken place before and those which are taking place now,” he added.