Collapse of school education : six teachers for as many students in Jampui Jala, Agartala schools flooded with surplus teachers

By Our Correspondent

Agartala, August 6, 2026

The signs of a near total collapse of school education in Tripura are now very prominent-what with acute shortage of teachers and what with students and their guardians preferring privately run English medium schools to government run schools. In a clinching proof of what is happening to the school education in the government sector , there are altogether six teachers for only six students in the Pashchim Gurupada Colony junior basic school under Jampui Jala subdivision. The overall infrastructure of this school is not as bad as in many other places but the lack of students strength has emerged as a major problem for the viability of this school . There are days when only one student appears in the school and on many occasions not even a single student comes to the school.

Speaking on condition of anonymity a teacher of the school said that the main problem is that there is a privately run school close to the government junior basic school while there is another school only two hundred metres away from the government run junior basic school. Those who run the private schools convince the guardians and students that they will impart better education and facilities and people fall for this . The government has not taken any corrective action in the matter.

Besides, the schools in Agartala town and even in the outlying areas of Agartala are now flooded with teachers in excess of required strength. Even in the Suryamoni Nagar HS school, nine KM south of Agartala there are now close to one hundred teachers for around 800 students . This is clearly surplus as the optimum student-teacher ratio is 40 : 01-that one teacher per forty students. In the leading schools of Agartala where wives and daughters of officers, engineers and doctors are at work the situation is worse as there is not only a glut of teachers but the teachers themselves, specially the female teachers show little interest in taking class or in performing school duties .

They spend their time in languid afternoons either gazing at mobile or doing their familial works while sitting in common rooms and the heads of institutions do not dare to tell them anything for fear of being transferred to schools beyond urban centres. Sources said that in most of these posh schools the newly recruited TET-qualified teachers are made to work extremely hard , having to take at least five classes daily. But when it comes to invigilation work for job-related exams the senior teachers come and do duty with alacrity as they are entitled to payment by exam-holding authority and for these exams the new and young teachers are kept out of duty . For others the new and non-influential teachers are made to work by the sweat of their brows , taking too many classes and doing duties beyond the schedule .

Sources said that the department of school education knows everything but is doing nothing to resolve this problem . Unless the anomalies are removed and situation changed the entire school education system in the state will totally collapse sooner rather than later.

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