Pampore: Work on the District Institute of Education Training (DIET) complex, here in the Pampore area of Pulwama district, continues to be on halt for more than three years now, as the project languishes eleven years after work was first started on it.
With an aim to provide a platform for the training of teachers, and make the education sector a little more efficient, the government conceived and sanctioned this DIET complex in around 2010.
The work of the project was handed over to the Roads and Buildings Department, at an estimated cost of 4.5 Crore Rupees and a deadline of around three years.
“Unfortunately, the project has been languishing now for the past 11 years and the work has been put to a halt for more than three years now,” a source in the education department told Kashmir Reader.
Teachers in the district lament that they have been forced to use a cramped one-room arrangement at the local Higher Secondary School in Pampore as a DIET center, as the building remains incomplete.
“We had high hopes with the project and thought we will finally get a place where the energies of the teachers can be channelized in a proper manner,” a teacher from Pampore told Kashmir Reader, requesting anonymity.
Other teachers, Kashmir Reader talked to, said that the project has been politicized even while the administration claims to work towards the betterment of the sector.
“Just because the project was started by a different government, it was treated with indifference by successive regimes here in Kashmir. As a result, we remain devoid of the center, which is of immense importance if we want the education sector to be reformed in a positive manner,” the teachers said.
They said that they have been repeatedly appealing to the authorities to speed up the construction of the building but to no avail. “Education should be kept out of politics and everyone should ensure that every education-related project is treated as an utmost priority. Only then can we give our children a better future,” the teachers said.
Sources in the Roads and Buildings Department said that the funds were scarce for the project all along, and completely dried up after a few years. “As a result, there was a serious cost escalation on the project and a new detailed project report had to be submitted for approval,” the source told Kashmir Reader, “There has been no headway since, despite the gap of more than three years. There are dues to be paid on the project as well, which remain stalled,”
Kashmir Reader talked to the Chief Engineer Roads and Buildings Department, Rafiq Ahmad, who acknowledged that a fresh detailed project report has been submitted for the project.
“There has been no headway on that,” the chief engineer said, without divulging any further details on the issue.

Suhail A Shah