The Ernakulam district collector announced a holiday for all educational institutes on Facebook, but only at around 8:25am.
Published Aug 04, 2022 | 3:15 PM ⚊ Updated Aug 04, 2022 | 3:15 PM
Ernakulam district collector declared holiday for educational institutions citing heavy rain. (South First)
As heavy rains continued to lash Kerala for the fourth day, the Ernakulam district collector took to Facebook to announce a holiday for educational institutions on Thursday, 4 August — only to draw the ire of netizens.
The reason? His post came at 8:25am, by which time most children had already left for school.
The Facebook post has already received over 4,000 responses, most of them unflattering.
District Collector Renu Raj’s post on the collector’s official Facebook page read: “All educational institutions including professional colleges in Ernakulam district will be closed today (04/08/22) due to widespread heavy rains.”
“Our children had already gone to school,” Jyotsna Nair commented on the district collector’s post.
Sincy Anil, a parent, in her comment wrote that her daughter goes to the lower kinder garden in Bhavan’s School in the district and their classes begin at 8:15am. And as transportation during the rain is difficult, the notification should have come much earlier.
The decision mainly caused trouble for the parents who sent their kids to school and left for work.
Sreejith Panickar, a political analyst, replied to the collector: “Rulers can have a little more common sense. It requires parental preparation, in matters including meal prepping and travelling to and from school. You can ask the Meteorological Department about the forecast the day before. Accordingly, we can decide whether we need a holiday or not. It has been half an hour since the children have left, and the approach of giving leave one hour early if needed is not correct.”
The collector, responding to the comments and criticism over the late holiday announcement, said in another post that the holiday was declared to avoid accidents as the rain which started at night continued in the morning.
The post also said students who had reached the schools should not be sent back home.
There were reports that students were sent back home after the first hour by many schools. However, several CBSE board schools decided to go ahead with classes.
