AIADMK interim general secretary Edappadi K. Palaniswami on Thursday condemned the Tamil Nadu government for the delay in providing school uniforms, books, notebooks and other educational utilities for students in government and government-aided schools in the State.
In a statement, Mr. Palaniswami claimed under former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa’s government, all these would be distributed within the first two weeks of reopening of schools. But, under this DMK government, only a few of the items have been distributed to some extent. “For the school uniforms, the materials have been given to the cooperative societies only now. There are questions as to when the raw materials will be turned into uniforms and distributed to the students,” he said.
Mr. Palaniswami charged that the School Education Minister Anbil Mahesh was spending his time only as a ‘fan club association’ member of a particular person [DMK MLA Udhayanidhi Stalin] instead of concentrating on the work of his department.
The leader of the Opposition also charged that the DMK government has not shown keenness to implement the free laptop scheme introduced by Jayalalithaa.
Mr. Palaniswami alleged there were doubts whether the DMK government was wantonly resorting to such delays in distributing these free utilities to the students in order to promote private schools run by their party cadre.