Nashik: The Maharashtra state government has announced the reopening of physical classes. The state education minister Varsha Gaikwad has confirmed it on Friday. Schools in both rural and urban areas will reopen from August 17. Schools across the state have been closed since March last year when the coronavirus pandemic hit. Since, the classes were started online for all the students.
The minister Gaikwad said, “Offline classes will commence in rural areas for students from classes 5 to 8, while those in cities will be for students from classes 8 to 12 following Covid-19 protocols,”. On-campus classes, however, will be allowed only in the areas where Covid-19 infections are consistently low, the minister added.
Currently, Maharashtra has 19,997 secondary and higher secondary schools with over 45 lakh students in classes 8 to 12. In July, the Maharashtra government had decided to reopen schools in areas where no Covid-19 cases have been reported over a months’ period. Subsequently, from July 12, as many as 5,947 schools in rural areas resumed on-campus classes for students of classes 8 to 12.
The government has also given guidelines for opening the schools. As per the guidelines issued, only maximum of 15 to 20 students will be allowed in a classroom at once with schools requiring to ensure there is a distance of at least six feet between two students. It had made the use of masks compulsory and directed that students would have to wash their hands frequently.
