PUNE: While Principal Secretary of Education Department Vandana Krishna has given a list of materials to be made available at washrooms in government schools, interestingly, the mention of sanitary napkins or their vending machines has been totally missing from the letter.
Moreover, the Principal Secretary of the State thinks that the availability of mirrors and shelves was of greater importance.
Likewise, most of the government schools do not have any regular scheme or provision to provide girls with sanitary napkins.
In order to ensure that the girl students at the government schools across the State were able to use the toilets, Krishna, in her letter dated April 5, 2019, directed the Maharashtra Prathamik Shikshan Parishad to see to it that the toilets were clean and well-maintained.
According to the U-DISE Data of 2017-18, there are 66,750 government schools (with classes I to XII) in the State, out of which 65,103 have separate washrooms
for girls. A letter addressed to the chiefs of the municipal corporations and zilla parishads mentioned that many girls avoid using toilets at schools due to their unhygienic condition.
“This may lead to health problems amongst adolescent girls. For the overall health of the girls in government schools, it was necessary that the toilets were in good condition,” Krishna added. The 10 per cent of the composite school grants has been allotted for Swachhata Action Plan, which should include maintenance of the toilets beside other things. “Either using these funds or by acquiring more with crowdfunding or from CSR wings of corporates, the schools need to fix their toilets and keep them in usable condition,” the letter added.
Krishna also has advised the schools to equip the washrooms with all the necessities. These include mirrors, hooks to hang bags and clothes, shelves, dustbins, buckets and tumblers, handwash and lights.
In times where the awareness regarding menstruation and use of sanitary napkins was gaining momentum, it was unfortunate that this issue does not receive any mention in the administrator’s letter of a progressive state like Maharashtra.
