Cost of Hate: In MP, School demolished despite Panchayat NOC
Demolishing a school building despite having No Objection Certificate (NOC), from the village Panchayat just out of hatred is a major setback for India's progress
Bhopal: A country's true strength lies in its education and healthcare systems. Demolishing a school building despite having No Objection Certificate (NOC), from the village Panchayat just out of hatred is a major setback for the country's progress and an insult to every rational citizen. It is unfortunate that leaders prioritize divisive and hateful agendas over the well-being of their people.
The above claim has been made by Ms Razia Masood, a Social Activist based in Bhopal, in a statement in regard to a recent incident which occurred in Dhaba village, located in the Bhainsdehi tehsil of Betul district in Madhya Pradesh.
The village has a population of approximately 2000, including only four Muslim families. The nearest school is about five kilometers away from the village.
With a noble intention, a village resident Abdul Naeem spent ₹20 lakh from his earnings to build a school for Dalit and tribal children. To address the significant lack of education among the children, Naeem planned to start classes from nursery to eighth grade.
However, a few days ago, a rumour spread that Naeem had built an "illegal madrasa" and was providing "unauthorized" education to the children. According to the villagers, the Tehsildar, Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM), and Station House Officer (SHO) came to investigate and gave a clean chit to school. They also asked Naeem to obtain a NOC from the Panchayat.
When Naeem went to the Panchayat office, his application was refused, and he was told to come back on another day. Naeem says that all his land documents are correct and complete, and he had also submitted an application to the School Education Department for permission to operate the school from December 30th, 2025.
Despite this, an order had already been issued to demolish his building. When the villagers protested this decision, the Panchayat hastily issued an NOC for the building. In the evening, the SDM told Naeem that "there is a lot of pressure from above and the school will have to be demolished." The pressure was so immense that even the Supreme Court guidelines held no weight. The villagers pleaded that if any law had been violated, it could be rectified by paying a fine but the building should not be demolished as it would jeopardize the children's future and prevent them from studying.
When the demolition order was not withdrawn even after the NOC was issued, the villagers decided to meet the Collector at his public grievance redressal program, 80 kilometers away. However, as hundreds of villagers, along with Naeem, reached the Betul Collector's office to submit a memorandum where they were stopped by the police.
Next day hundreds of villagers accompanied Naeem to the Betul Collector's office, but the police stopped them en route. After being held up for several hours, they were finally allowed to proceed and presented their case at the public grievance redressal forum. The Collector assured them of an inquiry, but meanwhile, the Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM) was allegedly busy carrying out the demolition of the building.
Later on a video of the Betul district officer surfaced in which he was justifying the demolition of the school building even after the Panchayat had issued a No Objection Certificate (NOC).
The next day, another official statement from the district officer was released, in which he again defended the bulldozer action as legitimate.
However, he has no answer as to why the school building was demolished even after receiving the NOC from the Panchayat!
Ms Razia Masood asserted that this type of blatant act of communal fanaticism and racist oppression crushes the education of marginalized communities and reveals the ugly face of systematic oppression. We're witnessing a dark era where destroying schools and shutting universities is being normalized and celebrated, all in the name of hateful ideology.
The time has come to condemn and eradicate such hateful injustices, she concluded.
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