Many Bengal colleges not holding Students’ Week as they kept waiting for formal order

West Bengal colleges debate celebrating Students' Week without official orders, while schools receive clear guidelines for the event.

To celebrate or not to celebrate is the question for many colleges in West Bengal regarding Students’ Week, a recently launched annual event held from January 2 to 8, as they have not received a formal order from the State government for its conduct.

While several colleges have gone ahead with the programme anyway, several others, not having received the order, have decided to hold the planned events independently — and not under any banner — or club them with other upcoming occasions.

“We were planning to observe the Students’ Week in collaboration with Deshbandhu College for Girls’ this year. Students were eager to take part in different competitions including creative writing and also participate in events including quiz, debate, recitation, drawing, extempore and poster writing. There were to be sessions on how students can avail government scholarships. Once we get the order from the appropriate authority, we shall organise the same events with great zeal,” Jaydeep Sarangi, principal of Kolkata’s New Alipore College, which had already prepared banners for its Students’ Week collaboration this year with Deshbandhu College for Girls, said.

“In all likelihood, we shall hold the Students’ Week events along with those we have planned for Swami Vivekananda’s birthday (January 12),” Dr. Sarangi said.

Another principal, Ramakrishna Chakraborty of K.K. Das College, too said that his institution will go ahead with the events that had been planned, though they won’t be held under the banner of Students’ Week. “Normally we get to see government orders in our WhatsApp groups well in time, but this year we didn’t see anything related to Students’ Week. But we are going ahead with what we had planned. Tomorrow we will have sports events, after that we will hold an event on how students can benefit from various government schemes,” Dr. Chakraborty said.

Students’ Week, meant to be observed by every college and school in West Bengal, was started in 2022, but that year it was mostly held online because the COVID-19 pandemic had just about receded. It was only from 2023 that it began to be celebrated widely. Unlike colleges, schools face no dilemma whether to hold the event or not because they received clear-cut guidelines on December 20 as to how to conduct Students’ Week.

“This week-long event, held at the start of the academic session, aims to ease students into the new school year through fun and enjoyable activities. It sets a positive tone for the rest of the year by promoting joyful learning, fostering life skills, enhancing 21st-century skills, and emphasising inclusive education, laying the foundation for a vibrant and engaging academic experience,” the School Education Department said in its circular to schools.