In an unprecedented bold show of protest, students enrolled at the sub-school in Bharatnagar Pul Patiya village of Bhuj taluka, Kutch district, have withdrawn from the education system.
The development has taken place weeks into the 2025-26 academic year.
According to reports, all the 134 students have collected their School Leaving Certificates (LCs), leaving the single-storeyed, dilapidated school building deserted and locked.
Minaxi Chauhan, principal of Ambedkarnagar Prathmik Shala, verified that the students had collected their LCs by the end of July.
The protest, residents said, is aimed at the administration’s longstanding refusal to upgrade the sub-school into an independent primary school despite repeated pleas.
Despite having made continuous efforts for six years now, the villagers’ demand for a standalone school — complete with a proper building, full staff, and educational facilities — has been ignored. Their appeals, which included letters of recommendation from a local MLA and an MP, have been unheeded.
The current facility, run from a tin-shed community hall with zero basic amenities and just two teachers for Classes 1 to 8, served almost twice the number of students as the main school in Ambedkarnagar Prathmik Shala — which lies around 2 km away and has only 72 students.
By July 31, every single student from the Bharatnagar Pul Patiya sub-school had been issued their LCs, with 72 of them signed in the span of just four days between July 25 and July 29.
AAP’s Gujarat president Isudan Ghadvi told Vibes of India that the incident has exposed the education system in Gujarat and it ‘s shameful for the state’s Chief Minister and the education minister.
Forget about other facilities, students are not even given a proper school and they have to study in a sub-school, he observed.
“It is a long-standing demand by the parents which has not been met,” Ghadvi said, demanding that the Chief Minister should intervene immediately.
“Teachers are not being recruited and the recruitment is on a temporary basis,” he told VOI. “The future generation will be uneducated and how will Gujarat be progressive then?” he questioned.
The Directorate of Primary Education most recently on July 23 insisted that the institution continue operating as a sub-school — a recommendation that triggered the collective withdrawal by parents, who declared their children would not return to studies until they were given the dignity of learning in a fully functional school.
Taluka Primary Education Officer (TPEO) Nilesh Gor had previously stated that a key reason for not upgrading the sub-school was the unavailability of a suitable building in the village that could house an educational facility.
In a bid to keep children from falling further behind academically, the villagers have devised a temporary workaround. Sikandar Alana Sumra, a prominent community organiser and activist leading the movement, has offered his ancestral property to host a makeshift school until permanent infrastructure is sanctioned by the education department.
Sumra revealed that his cousin, Kasam Alimamad Sumra, had submitted an affidavit pledging two family-owned buildings with tiled roofs — one with two rooms and the other with one — located side-by-side, as temporary classrooms for the village children.
TPEO Gor has acknowledged this initiative, stating that the primary obstacle — the absence of premises — had been addressed by the community. He confirmed that the offered buildings had been freshly painted and prepared for immediate use, and that a formal proposal had been sent to the Education Department in Gandhinagar for further action.
Moreover, Valji Ahir, the Sarpanch of Jikadi Juth Gram Panchayat — under whose jurisdiction Bharatnagar Pul Patiya falls — had already passed a resolution handing over land for a new school building. Asked about the status of the new school, TPEO Gor said the proposal to establish a permanent school in the village remains under consideration at the district level.
Kutch Collector Anand Patel could not be reached for comment.
Gujarat Congress spokesperson Hiren Banker told Vibes of India that the BJP government in Gujarat has failed to give education in the remote villages of the state. He alleged that the fact that so many students have to take school leaving certificates proves that the education department has become the epicenter of corruption.
For now, however, the crumbling remains of the locked school building stand as a stark reminder of official neglect — and of a community determined to no longer remain silent.
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