Government bars private lessons in primary schools following Thakurgaon rape allegations

The Directorate of Primary Education warns that any breach of the instruction would hold “those in charge accountable”

Teachers will no longer be able to give any sort of private lessons to students in classrooms of government primary schools.

The Directorate of Primary Education on Tuesday issued a directive instructing school administrations to stop all sorts of coaching, private tuition and other activities outside the school curriculum.

Mentioning that the directive would take “immediate effect”, it pointed out that deviation from the instruction would cause “those in charge to be held accountable”.

The decision follows the report of rape of a fifth grader who allegedly went to a government primary school for private lessons in Thakurgaon.

On Tuesday, Md Raihul Islam, assistant director of the directorate's Policy and Operation Division, said: “We’ve heard that coaching classes or private lessons are being given in classrooms after school or on holidays.”

“In no way can school classrooms be used for private lessons or coaching classes. If any teacher or someone else holds coaching classes or gives private lessons in school classrooms, that person would be responsible for what happens,” the directorate said.

The directive was sent to all divisional deputy directors, PTI superintendents, district primary education officers and Upazila secondary education officers on Monday.

The accused teacher in the alleged incident in Thakurgaon, Mozammel Haque Manik was arrested. A disgruntled crowd of people beat him up when he was taken to court on Sunday morning.

The family of the student said Manik used to give private lessons to students on holidays.