Ari­ma Hin­du School, has a new, per­ma­nent home on Tumpuna Road. The school, for­mer­ly lo­cat­ed on Tem­ple Street had to be re­lo­cat­ed be­cause its for­mer Tem­ple Street, Ari­ma lo­ca­tion was a known drug den and a hotbed of crime.

In 2019 two peo­ple were shot, one fa­tal­ly when a land­lord tried to col­lect mon­ey from an er­rant ten­ant, and some months lat­er gun­men ran through the school. Both in­ci­dents oc­curred dur­ing school hours, forc­ing chil­dren in­to lock­down mode. Since then the school has moved twice. Most re­cent­ly stu­dents have been oc­cu­py­ing an­oth­er lo­ca­tion in Mal­abar which was al­so serv­ing as makeshift lo­ca­tion for an­oth­er school which was await­ing re­pairs.

She said Prin­ci­pal So­han See­ta­hal knew bet­ter was com­ing and he was hap­py to make do with sit­u­a­tions that were not ide­al

“I want to salute his at­ti­tude,” she said. “His pos­i­tiv­i­ty I’m sure would have been trans­lat­ed to teach­ers and stu­dents, and let­ting them know that even though the cir­cum­stances are not al­ways ide­al they make the best of the cir­cum­stance un­til bet­ter can be done.”

Dr Gads­by Dol­ly said on any giv­en day there are at least five schools that are at threat of clos­ing be­cause of in­fra­struc­ture is­sues. She said the need for cap­i­tal in­fra­struc­ture fund­ing is im­por­tant.

Prin­ci­pal So­han See­ta­hal thanked the Min­istry for its work on the school. He said “With scarce re­sources and the chal­lenges of the covid-19 Pan­dem­ic, we are blessed to have time­ly de­liv­ery of this in­sti­tu­tion. Our chil­dren now have a place of learn­ing to de­vel­op to their max­i­mum po­ten­tial.”

Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion Lisa Mor­ris Ju­lian, who’s al­so the MP for the area, com­mend­ed the re­silience of the staff, and pupils of the school. She said Ari­ma Hin­du has al­ways been a school that takes in every­one, in­clud­ing her own moth­er al­most 60 years ago, who had been turned away from oth­er schools in the area.

Res­i­dents and passers-by raised con­cerns about the pos­si­ble traf­fic the school will cause. Con­cerns were al­so raised about flood­ing in the area. Guardian Me­dia was as­sured it's all be­ing looked at by the Ari­ma Bor­ough Cor­po­ra­tion.

Par­ents must be held re­spon­si­ble

Al­so speak­ing at the open­ing was Act­ing Sec­re­tary-Gen­er­al of the Sanatan Dhar­ma Ma­ha Sab­ha Vi­jay Ma­haraj thanked the Min­istry for its col­lab­o­ra­tion in the school. Speak­ing off top­ic on the is­sue of school vi­o­lence he said par­ents must be­gin to take re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for their chil­dren’s ac­tions.

“We will not al­low the teach­ers alone to car­ry the bur­den of our chil­dren. Par­ents must step up,” Ma­haraj said. “Par­ents have that role to play. The child is an emp­ty sponge. They are their home. What­ev­er five let­ter words six let­ter word four let­ter word they learn is at home first. They don't come to school to learn it. They learned else­where, they learned in the en­vi­ron­ment for two years or chil­dren who suf­fer.