No English version textbooks yet

The government is yet to start printing English-version textbooks for four lakh secondary and primary students, more than a month and a half inside the beginning of the academic session, reports NewAge.
Finding no other means, some students have collected one or two copies of used books, had them photocopied, or bought some old versions of the books for high prices.
English-version textbooks, published by the government, were in the past years sold to students of schools offering education in keeping with the National Curriculum and Textbook Board curriculum and a number of kindergartens.
But the education minister in the last week of January announced that the government would also provide the English version books free as it did in the case of Bangla-version textbooks.
The minister also announced the government would complete printing and distribution of the books in a week from the announcement but National Curriculum and Textbook Board officials on Wednesday told New Age they were yet to start printing the books.
‘We will start printing one lakh copies of the English-version books for the students of Class I to V in a day or two. But no decision on the books for secondary classes has yet been made,’ said the textbook board chairman, Mostafa Kamaluddin.
When asked about the delay in the printing of English-version books, the board chairman said, ‘We only implement the decision of the education ministry.’
The education minister, Nurul Islam Nahid, also kept silent when he was asked the same question.
A textbook board official, however, said the ministry was very much busy with Bangla-version books for secondary classes. They did not give any attention to the textbooks for primary, English version, madrassah and technical students.
‘The translation of some new chapters in the textbooks that were included for the students of the ongoing academic year was delayed,’ he said.
‘A team led by a Jahangirnagar University professor was asked to translate the chapters but the team made a delay in completing the job,’ a textbook board official said.
Audrija Ameen, a student of Class VI at Viqarunnisa Noon School, told New Age on Wednesday most of her classmates were attending classes with old copies of the Bangla book only.
‘I am attending classes with four photocopied books but the Bangla version students in my school are attending classes with all the books. Our classes end at least two hours earlier than the schedule as we do not have the textbooks,’ she said.
Shahanara Begum, principal of the Ideal School, said most of her students of the English-version section were attending classes without books. There are more than 1,000 such students.
The government also failed to publish the English-version books in 2009 in time and about four lakh students, who are students the English version, suffered for this.

Courtesy of NewAgebd