Thousands of guardians of school going children in Narayanganj have to count crore of taka to purchase extra books for their children. The authorities of high schools in the district are forcing the students to collect extra five books besides the mandatory NCTB textbooks.
It was alleged that the schools authorities are doing this as they get financial benefit from publishers for prescribing the books. A guardian said, “Many schools force the students to collect the extra book in exchange of bribe from private book publishers.”
Some dishonest publishers earn huge amount of money by selling the extra books.
According to the District Education Office sources, there are about 162 high schools in the district.
If the average calculation considers that five hundred students study in every school, then the students figure reaches 81 thousand. If each guardian purchases books of two thousand taka, the total amount reaches almost 16 crore taka.
All the high schools in the district had already asked the students to collect five extra books. The books are English grammar, Bengali grammar, two rapid readers and a general knowledge. Four of the books were provided by the government at first day of the year free of cost.
The guardians are facing pressure to educate their children as they have to spend a big amount of money to purchase the books that imposed by their children’s schools.
When trying to collect comment of district education officer in this regard, a research officer named Nazmun Nahar received the phone call and answered that it is illegal.
However, Additional District Commissioner (ADC-education) was not found over the telephone for comment. A source of DC office said that the matter beyond the control of local administration.