Ahmedabad: Over 1.25 lakh students studying in schools run by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) will be offered free haircuts.
The civic body in Ahmedabad has tied up with an organisation to provide haircuts to students studying in the 380 municipal schools of the city. The haircuts, however, will not be compulsory and the project is being done to boost the “swachhata campaign”.
The Municipal School Board has given the clearance to International School of Aesthetics and Spa, commonly known as the ISAS Beauty School, to implement the project in its schools.
Enrollment of students for the programme was to begin from Monday, but will now start by the end of this month and haircuts will be initially given once a fortnight, after which it will become a weekly feature.
The move is significant because most of the students who attend municipal schools here are from families with lower income and a sizable number of these children live in slums. The costs involved in getting haircuts done for their children is, in many cases, difficult for families to bear.
The haircuts will be given keeping in mind religious customs, beliefs and practices of the families and after a written consent from the parents, officials said.
Chairman of the AMC Municipal School Board Pankaj Chauhan told News18, “I believe this is not just the first time in Gujarat’s education history, but anywhere in the country, that a project like this is being implemented. Not only will it promote hygiene and cleanliness, but will reduce financial burden on the parents as well. We expected to launch the project from today, but we will officially flag it off from the 26th of this month”.
The chairman added that according to the agreement, men will cut the hair of boys and women will cut the hair of girls studying in municipal schools. He said that quite naturally, a larger number of boys are likely to get haircuts than girls, as girls and their parents prefer that they grow long hair.
“Our intention is to ensure that besides providing good education, the children studying in municipal schools stay hygienic as well,” Chauhan said.
The Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation run Municipal School Board offers education to students in six different mediums – Gujarati, Hindi, English, Marathi, Urdu and Tamil. Over 1.25 lakh students from across the city study in 380 schools of the Municipal School Board.
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