Bihar Teacher Dozes Off In Class And Student Fans Her; Internet Users Demand Action

Indian education is in a dire need of reformation, especially public education. It also needs infrastructural changes as the students to teacher ratio in many regions is lopsided. Time and again videos from the classroom showing anomalies have gone viral on the internet.

However, this video that emerged from a Bihar school is being viewed as very distasteful and has internet users in a rude shock. While children dozing off in classes and getting reprimanded is a common scene; in a now viral video, a teacher was seen conking off in a classroom. If that was not enough, the video then showed a student fanning the teacher. This angered the internet users.

Bihar Teacher Dozes Off In Class

In the video circulating on the internet, the teacher is seen fast asleep in her chair. As other students are sitting idly on the floor, a little girl in uniform is seen standing next to her and fanning as she is napping comfortably.

According to the reports, the video surfaced from Bihar’s Champaran district’s government primary school in the Bagahi Puraina village.

The video drew ire from people and many slammed the teacher and even tagged authorities urging them to initiate strict action against her.

Suggested Reading: Sex Education For Kids Labelled Immoral, But Sexual Harassment Is Not?

Although it is unclear whether an action was initiated against the teacher, a news report quoted the teacher defending herself. Identified as Babita Kumari, the teacher elaborated that she was unwell and was thus resting in the chair.

Another viral video from a different Bihar school showed two teachers imparting Hindi and Urdu lessons from one blackboard simultaneously. The video had also left internet users in splits.

Bihar, although throughout history, has been a major centre of learning—its education is lacklustre now.

A 2021 report released by United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) stated that a total of 56% (nearly 2.2 lakh) teaching positions in government schools of Bihar were vacant; of that, 89% are in rural areas which is the highest across India. The lopsided student-teacher ratio in Bihar resulted due to the vacancy which is thereby affecting the quality of education.

Official figures note that Bihar has 72,663 government schools, including 42,573 primary, 25,587 upper primary, 2,286 secondary and 2,217 senior secondary schools.