The attacks at St. Joseph’s School — a popular school known for providing quality education at affordable rates–by Maoist rebels in the western district of Gorkha has left local people clueless.
The rebels said they had bombed the school “to protest against the recent arrest of two Maoist leaders in India and the commitment expressed by India to extend military assistance to Nepal during Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba’s recent visit to New Delhi”. This is the third time the school has faced the wrath of the rebels since its establishment in 1994.
On Sunday night (September 12), a group of rebels exploded a powerful pressure-cooker bomb within the school premises destroying over a dozen computers, stationeries and teaching materials. They also made off with a computer in the school.
Principal of the school, Fr. Denis D’Souza, said that he was about to go to bed that evening when a group of Maoists came and asked him to open the school’s computer room. “After I opened the room, they took the best computer in the school and blasted a bomb in the room destroying all the remaining computers”, said Fr. D’Souza.
This is the third time that the rebels targeted the school. The school was closed for two years from 1999-2001 following threats from the rebels. According to school sources, they even asked for “security fee” from the school in the past.
The school authorities deny the Maoist blame. “St Joseph’s School in Gorkha has nothing to do with India. It’s a hundred percent Nepali school run with Nepali money,” said Prefect Apostolic Amulya Nath Sharma, the founder of the school.
Recalling that late King Birendra had personally requested him to open the school in the rural areas of Gorkha district, Sharma says, “The school has no foreign investment- not even a single penny, except during the construction of the school building.”
He adds, “We established the school in the village area so as to avail maximum benefits to the poor and underprivileged communities.”
The School has 550 students at present. The highest fee that the school charges is Rs.350 for Grade Nine students. Besides, the school has granted partial scholarships to nearly 100 students, mostly to children belonging to underprivileged Kumal and Magar communities in the area. They have to pay up to Rs.100 a month to acquire quality education, which they could not afford otherwise.
People from the local community said the attack on St. Joseph’s School plainly showed the inability or perhaps a flat refusal of the Maoists to distinguish between missionary schools run with dedication and vision and one run as a pure business.
Ironically, senior Maoist leader, Dr Baburam Bhattrai, himself is a product of a missionary-run school, the Amar Jyoti Janata High School (also known as Luitel School) in the same district (Gorkha). He had topped the nationwide SLC exams in the seventies.
As the quality in the government-run schools is well below standard, it’s most unlikely now that other students from this district could aspire to achieve similar feats– in the academic arena. nepalnews.com Akhil Tripathi Sept 14 04