Printing text books in excess!

- Thinakkural Editorial

(August 10, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Who is accountable for the printing of 25,000 text books in excess by the Department of Publication incurring a heavy expenditure of one crore rupees? Who is going to reimburse this heavy loss? The Minister of Education has ordered for an inquiry to be held as to who is responsible for this trend that has been going on for years and to take action against the errand officials even if they are on retirement. This is, in fact, a good news. But how is that senior officials in the department could not detect this so far. Is it that they were unaware or that they were indifferent? Who gave the orders to print them? Who allocated funds for this? These are relevant questions for which the Minister of Education must find answers.

It is difficult to believe that this was due to any oversight error. One is inclined to think whether there was any fraudulent motive behind this in view of the large number of books ordered and enormous amount of money involved.

Initially, all text books were printed at the Government Press. But, with the passage of time, the printing of text books were given to the private sector. In such a context, due to the contacts between the private press and the education officials , such mal practices cannot be ruled out.

In any event, it is the people of the country who have to bear this burden!

(An English translation of the Editorial in Thinakkural, a Tamil daily, based in Colombo) - Sri Lanka Guardian