Over 3,000 students staying in Navodaya Vidyalayas during lockdown sent home: HRD Minister

Over 3,000 students, who were staying in 173 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas across the country due to the COVID-19-induced lockdown, have been safely sent back home, Union HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal 'Nishank' said on Thursday. Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas (JNVs) are co-educational residential schools run by the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti, an autonomous body under the human resource development (HRD) ministry. "The Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti has successfully completed the exercise of shifting of over 3,000 students who were staying in 173 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas in various parts of the country during the lockdown period," Nishank said.

In the backdrop of COVID-19 situation, the Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti (NVS) had preponed its summer vacation schedule and the JNVs were closed from March 21. "While majority of the students of the JNVs could travel to their respective residences, which are mostly within the district boundaries, before the imposition of the nationwide lockdown, 3,169 outstation students who were staying in 173 JNVs, under the migration scheme and 12 students who were attending preparatory classes at Centre of Excellence, Pune, for the JEE (Mains) exam could not travel to their residences," Nishank said.

"With further extension of the lockdown period, these outstation students (including girls) and mostly in the age group of 13 - 15 years, were increasingly becoming restless and homesick as they had not met their families for the past over six months," he said. Universities and schools across the country have been closed since March 16 when the Centre announced a countrywide classroom shutdown as one of the measures to contain the COVID-19 outbreak.

Later, a 21-day nationwide lockdown was announced on March 24, which came into effect the next day. It has now been extended till May 31. The death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 3,435 and the number of cases to 1,12,359 in the country on Thursday, registering an increase of 132 deaths and 5,609 cases in the last 24 hours, according to the Union Health Ministry.

The number of active COVID-19 cases stood at 63,624, while 45,299 people have recovered and one patient has migrated, it said..

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