by Saba Gul
Erratic power supply and the defunct generator at the regional Indra Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) centre Rajbagh makes students suffer who come from far off places to seek the study material.
The student’s alleged authorities of failing to provide them with the study material on time. “Authorities give us a lame excuse of power outages as the reason in failing to provide the material,” said Zubair Ahmad, a Postgraduate student.
Kashmir Life learnt that the generator there at the regional centre kursoo Rajbagh is defunct from past many days. Students who travel from the far off districts to get the study material have to go back without getting any material.
“From the past five days, I am visiting the regional office to collect my study material. Authorities are not paying heed to our queries. I have to travel a long distance to reach here. But I can’t come regularly due to ongoing pandemic,” Ahmad said.
According to students, authorities have to access their computers for verification of students and to check whether the parcel has been shipped in their name from Delhi or not.
Another student namely Shafat Ahmed said that “I wonder why cannot the authorities manage a generator set to prevent uncertainties in the power supply when it is the most sought regional centre in Kashmir.”
“I have to travel from a distant place and most of the students enrolled here belong to remote areas. We have to wait till hours for our turn and then all of the sudden electricity goes off,” he added.
Meanwhile, when Kashmir life correspondent brought this issue to the notice of Regional Director Dr Shamim Dar, he said that “we already have a generator but due to technical fault it is under repairment. However, we tried to hire local generator sets but our system is a complex one so it cannot fix the issue. We ourselves are trying our best to solve this problem”.
Another official namely Ishtiyaq Nazir said that “we are helpless as the erratic power supply has become a norm in Rajbagh area. I intimidated the concerned department and gave them an account of the problem. They assured us that the matter will be fixed within a day but nothing so far has been done.
