Landslips: 5 families rescued in Pathanamthitta
The Hindu
Konni region received 7.4 cm of rains in a span of two hours on Saturday
From crossing a river in surging waters to negotiating the forest routes amidst heavy rains in the night, a joint team of government officials and locals emerged as saviours when a fresh spell of heavy rains coupled with landslides struck Pathanamathitta on Saturday evening.
As many as 26 people of five families who had been caught in the landslides near the Panamkudantha waterfalls in Kurumbanmuzhy forests and the Kottamonpara bridge near Seethathodu were rescued during the rescue operations that lasted several hours. The families rescued were shifted to safer locations while efforts are now on to assess the damage sustained.
Several principals of government and private schools in Delhi on Tuesday said the Directorate of Education (DoE) circular from a day earlier, directing schools to conduct classes in ‘hybrid’ mode, had caused confusion regarding day-to-day operations as they did not know how many students would return to school from Wednesday and how would teachers instruct in two modes — online and in person — at once. The DoE circular on Monday had also stated that the option to “exercise online mode of education, wherever available, shall vest with the students and their guardians”. Several schoolteachers also expressed confusion regarding the DoE order. A government schoolteacher said he was unsure of how to cope with the resumption of physical classes, given that the order directing government offices to ensure that 50% of the employees work from home is still in place. On Monday, the Commission for Air Quality Management in the National Capital Region and Adjoining Areas (CAQM) had, on the orders of the Supreme Court, directed schools in Delhi-NCR to shift classes to the hybrid mode, following which the DoE had issued the circular. The court had urged the Centre’s pollution watchdog to consider restarting physical classes due to many students missing out on the mid-day meals and lacking the necessary means to attend classes online. The CAQM had, on November 20, asked schools in Delhi-NCR to shift to the online mode of teaching.