Anantnag: Six educational zones of this south Kashmir district are without Zonal Education Officers (ZEOs) badly affecting the administrative affairs of these zones.
Anantnag district has a total of twelve educational zones.
Out of twelve zones, sources said six are headless.
Headless zones include Bijbehara, Pahalgam, Aishmuqam, Shangas, Dooru and Verinag.
Some of these educational zones like Shangas, Srigufwara and Aishmuqam , sources said, are without heads for more than a year while others are without ZEOs for months.
“After the ZEOs posted in these zones were either promoted to higher positions or reached superannuation, authorities never bothered to fill these vacant posts,” they said.
Though, authorities have given charge of these zones to other officers of equal rank or to the principals of higher secondary schools but sources said this additional charge arrangement is not working well in the zones.
“In absence of full-fledged ZEOs, administrative affairs in these zones have been badly hit. Humanly it is not possible for one person to smoothly run the affairs of more than one institution,” they said.
Ironically, some principals are looking after two higher secondary schools and an educational zone.
For instance, Principal Higher Secondary School Chittergul has been holding the additional charge of HSS Chaklipora and zone Shangas, which has more than hundred schools.
Similarly, Principal Higher Secondary school Marhama is looking after two educational zones, Bijbehara and Srigufwara, one of the largest zones in the district with atleast 150 schools.
The charge to look after the zone Aishmuqam and high school L P Kalan in Pahalgam are lying with Principal Higher Secondary school Kullar for more than a year while ZEO Qazigund has the additional charge of zone Dooru also.
Educational zone Verinag, official sources, said is being looked after by the principal of a nearby higher secondary school.
“In the absence of full-fledged ZEOs it is the clerks who are calling the shots in these zones,” said an official.
Director School Education and Chief Education Officer (CEO) did not respond to the repeated calls from Precious Kashmir.
However, an officer in the office of DSEK said posts of ZEOs in many zones of the valley are vacant but they are functioning smoothly.
“Charge of these zones has been given to other officers and all these zones are functioning smoothly,” the officer said.
He, however, said filling the vacant ZEO posts is the domain of top authorities.