Alipurduar & Hooghly give 1st set of school uniforms to 100% students

KOLKATA: The Alipurduar and Hooghly districts have emerged as joint leaders in the distribution of new set of uniforms for students of class I to VIII of the government schools across the state.

Both districts have achieved 100 per cent coverage in handing over the first set of uniforms to students. Alipurduar has handed over school uniforms to 1.76 lakh students of 1625 schools in the district while Hooghly had done the same for over 5.68 lakh students of 4112 schools in the district. The new set of uniforms that have been handed over have been stitched by the SHG (Self Help Group) members. All uniforms have been prepared from fine new fabrics.

In Alipurduar, over 1000 SHGs were involved in the work in 27 stitching centres across the district spread across 7 blocks. "It was a pleasure to see the joy of the students after they received new set of uniforms," Surendra Kumar Meena, District Magistrate of Alipurduar said. Darjeeling has also performed exceedingly well having delivered nearly 98 per cent while Howrah and Malda have delivered over 93 and 91 per cent respectively. West Burdwan district has been the worst performer in this respect and has managed to deliver only 4 per cent of the first set of uniforms. Jhargram is also lagging behind having delivered a little over 16 per cent of the first set while Cooch Behar managed to give it to a little over 21 per cent. Interestingly, Kolkata's performance has not been satisfactory with 23.27 per cent students getting their first set of uniforms. The district administration has been asked by the MSME department to take all necessary measures to complete the distribution of both sets of uniforms by September 30 before the Durga Puja.