Thaindian News

New Delhi, April 30 (IANS) An NGO here Thursday asked the Education Department of the Delhi government to direct the schools to declare an early summer break as the mercury level in the national capital has crossed over 43 degrees Celsius.
The government and government-aided schools start their summer vacation Friday while most of the private schools in Delhi will begin their vacation only by May 15.

“With the temperature shooting up and the weather department declaring that Delhi is facing a heat wave condition, it’s the children who are the worst affected,” said Rahul Verma of Uday Foundation.

“Over the past 10 days, the weather has remain unchanged. When children return home from school in the afternoon, the temperature is at the highest. Keeping this in mind, we have written to the additional director of education of the Delhi government and other child rights agencies, asking them to direct private schools for an early summer vacation,” he added.

On Wednesday, the met department recorded the maximum temperature in Delhi at 43.5 degrees Celsius - a good four degrees above normal, thus becoming the hottest April day in five decades.

At 11.30 a.m. on Thursday, the temperature was recorded at 40.2 degrees Celsius and the weatherman predicted that the maximum temperature will hover around the 43-degree mark.

“Out of 5,000 schools in Delhi, the number of private schools is just approximately 1,200. Therefore, it should not be a big issue to issue state guidelines to the private schools to follow suit like the government schools to declare summer holidays, at least upto class eight, from May 1,” Verma said.