Chennai: The state’s year-old water bell initiative for schools, launched with much fanfare to keep students hydrated, has now hit a roadblock. Teachers and students show little interest in keeping the activity alive even as the city has seen searing heat over the last few weeks.As per the school education department’s circular issued in June last year, a special bell had to be sounded around 11am, 1pm and 3pm to remind students to drink water. In schools where these timings coincided with breaks, teachers had to ensure that students go out of classrooms only after drinking water. However, schools hardly follow the mandate — with some of them forgetting about the initiative and some shoddily enforcing it.“There was never any water break in our school. We can drink water whenever we are thirsty by asking permission. Those who do not have water bottles wait until the breaks to drink it from the dispenser if their friends don’t share,” a student of Chennai Middle School in Royapuram said. School HM Sharmila, however, said that the bells were being sounded regularly.At the Corporation high and higher secondary schools in Thiruvanmiyur, Adyar and Kotturpuram, students recalled staff sounding the bell only for a few days last year.In govt schools, heads say that students not bringing water bottles, despite the GO mandating the same, is the primary reason for the non-implementation of the initiative. “Students don’t even bring their books on some days, let alone water bottles. It is practically difficult for a teacher to constantly follow-up for every student,” M Ramalakhsmi, a retired HM said.She further said that in the initial days, after the initiative was launched, school heads used to send pictures of students drinking water to the respective BEOs. “That practice has stopped now,” she added.However school education director S Kannappan said that several schools still follow the rule, and only a few schools miss out. “Recently, we received a complaint and we followed up on the same. Several schools are taking the initiative seriously. Detailed instructions will be issued to chief education officers again to ensure that no schools miss out,” he added.Chennai chief education officer M Kabir said that the option of granting free water bottles to students will be explored to facilitate effective implementation of the initiative.
