Schooling? 50% Odisha children didn't get any support during pandemic, says study

By A Representative
Children, despite being less affected by coronavirus, are bearing a disproportionate burden of the implications of the Covid-19 pandemic and it is not just affecting their physical health but also their mental wellbeing. The prolonged school closure and movement restriction caused fear, anxiety, stress and social bearings among children.
Therefore, as schools reopen, addressing the mental wellbeing of these children will play a crucial role in helping them to overcome psychological distress and adjust smoothly in a post-covid classroom, revealed an online study report released by the non-profit Atmashakti Trust and its allies Odisha Shramajeebee Mancha and Mahila Shramajeebee Mancha, Odisha.
Conducted initially with 2,219 school going children of Class 1 to 8 from 84 blocks of 16 rural districts of Odisha, the report says, “Almost half of children (49.8 %) reportedly could not get required support from their family members to deal mainly with their emotional, social as well as learning support needs during the pandemic."
Out of 2,219 children, 91.5% were from government-run schools, 84.7% were from schools under School and Mass Education Department and 6.8% were from schools managed by Scheduled Tribe and Scheduled Tribe (ST & SC) Development, Minorities & Backward Classes Welfare Department, Government of Odisha.
Lack of access to online education also played a major role in children’s elevated mental stress. In all, 94.3% of the children interviewed for the study reported that they did not have access to a smartphone making their learning difficult and stressful.
Online education was attended merely by 10.2% of children. But the grave concern is that online education was quite confusing for 32.2% of children. Even 17% of children, who attended online classes anyway, showed their discontent, saying that it was challenging for them on many fronts.
While 12.8% of children have reported that they could not interact or ask questions with teachers in fear of being bullied by their teachers, 14.7% of them felt embarrassed to ask a question as the concept of online classes was something that none of them was prepared for.
Students’ attitudes and turns of mind are influenced to a great extent by the support they obtain from teachers. According to the study report, 68.9% of children said there was no connection between them and their teachers during the prolonged school closure period. Also, 60.3% of children reported that they were fearful about their learning loss when they heard about the school closure news.

73.2% of children reported that they experienced mental and physical abuse during the pandemic

Even though school closure was essential to reduce the transmission of Covid-19 among children, it affected the social behaviour of children badly. Shockingly, 73.2% of children reported that they experienced mental and physical abuse during the pandemic. Also, 47.3% of children said that they were engaged in household work to support their families.
“The study report reveals a trend of children reporting an increased difficulty to their mental wellbeing. As schools reopen, there is an emergent need for an action plan to address the mental wellbeing of children, especially those from the marginalised communities who were mostly left out of any support during the pandemic", said Ruchi Kashyap, Executive Trustee of Atmashakti Trust.
She added, "Counselling, extra support to children for improving their social behaviour, mentoring support to lessen their stress and fear in classrooms as well as in their homes is crucial to help them more effectively. In Mo Chatasali, we are helping over 1 lakh children to continue education in Odisha where mental wellbeing is one of the main aspects we are focusing on.”

Comments

Plastic burning in homes threatens food, water and air across Global South: Study

By Jag Jivan In a groundbreaking study spanning 26 countries across the Global South , researchers have uncovered the widespread and concerning practice of households burning plastic waste as a fuel for cooking, heating, and other domestic needs. The research, published in Nature Communications , reveals that this hazardous method of managing both waste and energy poverty is driven by systemic failures in municipal services and the unaffordability of clean alternatives, posing severe risks to human health and the environment.

From protest to proof: Why civil society must rethink environmental resistance

By Shankar Sharma* As concerned environmentalists and informed citizens, many of us share deep unease about the way environmental governance in our country is being managed—or mismanaged. Our complaints range across sectors and regions, and most of them are legitimate. Yet a hard question confronts us: are complaints, by themselves, effective? Experience suggests they are not.

Economic superpower’s social failure? Inequality, malnutrition and crisis of India's democracy

By Vikas Meshram India may be celebrated as one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, but a closer look at who benefits from that growth tells a starkly different story. The recently released World Inequality Report 2026 lays bare a country sharply divided by wealth, privilege and power. According to the report, nearly 65 percent of India’s total wealth is owned by the richest 10 percent of its population, while the bottom half of the country controls barely 6.4 percent. The top one percent—around 14 million people—holds more than 40 percent, the highest concentration since 1961. Meanwhile, the female labour force participation rate is a dismal 15.7 percent.

Kolkata event marks 100 years since first Communist conference in India

By Harsh Thakor* A public assembly was held in Kolkata on December 24, 2025, to mark the centenary of the First Communist Conference in India , originally convened in Kanpur from December 26 to 28, 1925. The programme was organised by CPI (ML) New Democracy at Subodh Mallik Square on Lenin Sarani. According to the organisers, around 2,000 people attended the assembly.

From colonial mercantilism to Hindutva: New book on the making of power in Gujarat

By Rajiv Shah Professor Ghanshyam Shah ’s latest book, “ Caste-Class Hegemony and State Power: A Study of Gujarat Politics ”, published by Routledge , is penned by one of Gujarat ’s most respected chroniclers, drawing on decades of fieldwork in the state. It seeks to dissect how caste and class factors overlap to perpetuate the hegemony of upper strata in an ostensibly democratic polity. The book probes the dominance of two main political parties in Gujarat—the Indian National Congress and the BJP—arguing that both have sustained capitalist growth while reinforcing Brahmanic hierarchies.

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

The greatest threat to our food system: The aggressive push for GM crops

By Bharat Dogra Thanks to the courageous resistance of several leading scientists who continue to speak the truth despite increasing pressures from the powerful GM crop and GM food lobby , the many-sided and in some contexts irreversible environmental and health impacts of GM foods and crops, as well as the highly disruptive effects of this technology on farmers, are widely known today.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

Transgender Bill testimony of Govt of India's ‘contempt’ for marginalized community

Counterview Desk India’s civil society network, National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM)* has said that the controversial transgender Bill, passed in the Rajya Sabha on November 26, which happened to be the 70th anniversary of the Indian Constitution, is a reflection on the way the Government of India looks at the marginalized community with utter contempt.

Search This Blog