A Minority School’s 42-Year Long Quest To Get A Building For Its Children

Forty two years ago, during dark days of Emergency, bulldozers were working overtime in the national capital. All the inconvenient structures that were unpleasant to the eyes of Sanjay Gandhi and his gang of elite Lutyens’ thugs were being razed to the ground. Needless to say the ones who lost out most - physically, emotionally, monetarily - were the poorest of poor spoiling the aesthetics of the city. The drive to sweep away the poverty from the heart of Delhi ended up sweeping away only the poor. Poverty remained. It just changed its address.

One of the unfortunate victims of that period was a minority school catering to children from Muslim community in Sadar Bazar area. While the residents of this area were shifted out to Inderlok, the four-storey Qaumi Senior Secondary school that was demolished and converted into a DDA colony, never got its land or building back. It’s been running from the premises of Shahi Idgah in Quresh Nagar for the last four decades with students studying in pitiable condition under makeshift tin sheds braving June summers and January winters with equal bravado, though not out of choice.

The school’s principal Mohammed Mohsin Amir and a management member, who spoke to Swarajya, put on a brave face. They see the glass half full. “Students study in broad daylight. They have vast open space to play. Where will you find such greenery? There is no problem at all,” they tell me with a smile on their face. On asking if there is any disturbance due to namaz in the masjid, the principal says it’s not a masjid but Idgah and prayer meeting happens only twice a year. What about the punishing weather during summers and winters? “The government declares a holiday when it’s too hot or cold. And students enjoy a lot here when rain is lashing down,” the principal says. Their vivacious attitude gives an impression that they don’t need a building and are happy conducting classes in the masjid compound. But they do.

The Delhi High Court took note of the “shocking state of affairs” of the school after activist and grandnephew of Maulana Azad, Firoz Bakht Ahmed, filed a writ petition in the court asking for restoration of land and building of the Qaumi school. On 15 September last year, the court directed the Government of National Capital Territory (GNCT) to call a meeting of all the stakeholders to resolve the issue of land for the school.

At the outset, the problem seems to be that there are too many stakeholders, i.e layers of government in the city: three corporations - North, South and East under Municipal Council Of Delhi (MCD); a Delhi Development Authority (DDA) whose chairperson is central government appointed LG; Land and Development Office (L&DO) which comes under Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs; Revenue Department and Department of Education (DoE) which are overseen by the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (GNCTD) currently ruled by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. It is no surprise then that turf wars are so common and no one wants to cede an inch.

The Chief Secretary in a meeting on 10 January 2018 asked DDA, NDMC, Waqf Board, L&DO and revenue department to inform the DoE if any piece of land, measuring at least 2,400 sq m can be made available in a 5-kilometre radius of the Idgah.

The Chief Secretary also asked the DoE to check with school management committee if it has the resources to build the school in case the government allots them land. While speaking to Swarajya, the principal and the school management refused to comment on the matter stating that it won’t be appropriate for them to say anything when the matter is sub judice. On whether they have the resources to build the school, the principal said, “We want a school, not land. What will we do with a piece of land? When the government had demolished the school building, it should give us a proper building in return.”

The management said that they are fine with any of the three options currently under consideration for allotment to school: a parking lot in front of Idgah owned by Wakf Board; a park on the south side of Idgah that comes under DDA; and a vacant building from where a slaughter house was recently shifted out so that it could be developed into a parking and commercial complex.

However, the government bodies who manage these lands are in no mood to give up their ownership.

DDA says it was MCD which demolished the building in 1976. NDMC says it has nothing to do with the matter. It informed the Department of Education that it’s the DDA colony which now stands at the site of erstwhile Qaumi school building and hence the question of MCD demolishing the school doesn’t arise. Further, DDA told the court that in 2002, the then Lieutenant General had allotted a 2,556 sq m land to the Qaumi school committee at zonal variant rate but the society didn’t deposit the land premium after which the allotment was cancelled. Now, it doesn’t have any such policy of allotting lands after change of rules in 2006.

Regarding the 16-acre land adjacent to Idgah that is currently lying vacant, the DDA says that its land use is classified as “recreational use (multipurpose park/ground” and as per current regulations it can’t be given to the school except via mode of auction.

Delhi Wakf Board which owns the parking space in front of Idgah claimed that the Wakf act also doesn’t allow transfer of land without inviting bids.

This leaves only the slaughter house building which the government plans to turn into a commercial-cum parking complex. NDMC informed the DoE that the matter of change of land use of slaughter house building is going on before the technical committee of DDA and the same “cannot be considered for any other purpose in favour of a private person/organisation.”

But the court has directed the NDMC to maintain status quo "regarding allotment, possession, construction and prescribed land use where the Idgah Slaughter House was existing" and has asked the Chief Secretary to approach the LG. It is doubtful that LG can do anything in the matter as regulations don’t allow for transfer of land in the manner that the court is exploring.

The court is, however, right in noting that the school which is funded by the government is denied of “basic amenities and tools of education”. If it were a non-minority school, the government would’ve shut it down long back citing the Right to Education (RTE) act. If the government hasn’t shifted the students to some other government schools in the nearby areas, it’s only because of the minority tag of the school.

Be that as it may, it is indisputable that children of this school are the real victims here. And if despite the lack of amenities, they haven’t picked another school, it shows their faith in the management. Irshad Ali, a primary teacher, who is teaching in the Qaumi school for the past 18 years, told Swarajya that the school conducts classes in morning and evening batches and boasts of more than 900 students, overwhelmingly from poor, labour class. One of the governments - centre, state or municipal - needs to step in and take the decision as early as possible.

The summer is coming!