Srinagar: Students and researchers in Kashmir are chafing at the Ministry of Human Resource Development’s (MHRD) advice to switch to digital and e-learning platforms in view of the coronavirus lockdown. They say they are unable to even register on these online platforms as the internet speed is restricted to a very slow 2G.
The MHRD in an advisory asked university students to switch to online and e-learning platforms including the government’s SWAYAM and SWAYAM PRABHA portals that broadcast educational programmes for students. Zahid, a student pursuing BTech in Electronics and Communication at the Islamic University of Science and Technology (IUST), Awantipora, told Kashmir Reader, “You can’t even register on the online portal, to start with, forget about studying online.”
Authorities restored low-speed 2G internet in Kashmir after completely suspending it for seven months since August 5 last year. Zahid said that he and his batchmates had attended hardly a week’s class work in their 7th semester when the government closed educational institutions again earlier this month in view of the COVID-19 scare.
Abrar, a student pursuing law at the Central University of Kashmir, said that low-speed internet was hampering access to online learning.
“You can’t even download files of a few MB memory, not to talk of the entire educational content. It will be very difficult for us to study online if the lockdown continues for months,” Abrar said.
He said that even the smartphone apps of the learning platforms could not be downloaded due to the low speed of internet.
While an international online educational portal has offered free access to its content to researchers in view of the COVID-19 lockdown, a student said that the low-speed internet was hampering downloading of the study material.
Arshid Aziz, a researcher at Kashmir University, demanded immediate restoration of high-speed internet in the valley in view of the difficulties faced by the student community.
Arshid said that several students are unable to even submit online application forms for various programmes in different universities.
“You have to go through audio and video content, besides the online documents, for your research work. This is impossible given the current speed of internet in Kashmir,” Aziz said.

Irshad Khan