Troops of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) have recently launched an internet tools-based learning centre for school-going children in a Naxal violence affected district of Chhattisgarh. The ‘smart’ school is located in Hadeli village of Kondagaon district and has about 50 children who are taught by the force personnel with the help of YouTube videos and other online education portals.
Kondagaon district headquarters, in the southern part of the central Indian state, is over 210 km from state capital Raipur. “These classes are organised daily by using internet-enabled phones of the jawans. As the mobile signal is weak, jawans put their mobiles at a height through bamboo poles and the network is connected through WiFi hotspot facility to the laptop,” a senior ITBP officer said. “The screen is enlarged on a wall for the children through a projector,” the officer said.
The classes are usually held in the evening and personnel who are graduates and are trained to hold school education sessions are deputed, he said. The children are also shown animation movies and basic learning videos during these sessions, the officer said.
The troops of the 41st ITBP battalion, posted in the district as part of the anti-Maoist operations grid, are also learning the local Halbi dialect from these children, he said. The ITBP was raised in 1962 in the aftermath of the Chinese aggression and its primary task is to guard the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China.
