Mustang. Educational institutions in Upper Mustang bordering northern China have been shifted to the valley to escape the cold. Due to the risk of heavy snowfall and extreme cold, the community and religious monastery schools under Lomanthang and Loghekar Damodar Kunda rural municipalities of Upper Mustang have been relocated.

There are three government community schools and four religious monasteries in Lomanthang rural municipality of Upper Mustang. All the community and monastery schools in the rural municipality have been shifted to the valley to escape cold, said Bikas KC, administrative chief of Lomanthang rural municipality.

According to KC, Chonhup Jhinju Primary School of Lomanthang Rural Municipality has come down to the valley before Dashain to escape the cold while the National Basic Lomanthang and Dibyadeep Secondary School have come down to the valley immediately after the Tihar festival to escape the cold.

According to KC, 50 students of Chonhup Jhinju Basic School, 20 students of National Basic School and 62 students of Dibyadeep Secondary School have been shifted to different places of Besi to run mobile classes.

Pokhara—Dibyadeep Secondary School of Lomanthang has been shifted to a private school building in Bijayapur, Pokhara. Chonhup Jhinju Basic has also been shifted to its own private building in Pokhara Hemja to run mobile classes.

Similarly, 20 students of national basic level of Lomanthang have been shifted to a rented building at Talchowk Kimbesi in Pokhara-Lekhnath, said KC.

Similarly, Manjushree, Niphuk Namdol, Pal and Namgyal and Mahakaruna religious monastery schools under Lomanthang rural municipality are also operating mobile classes in different places of Pokhara at their own expenses.

This kind of tradition has been going on every year to run mobile classes in the schools of Upper Mustang as it is difficult to continue the educational classes in the current place during the winter season.

The federal government has been providing Rs 350,000 per school as conditional grant to three community schools of Lomanthang every year under the title of operation and management of mobile schools. In addition to this, students above grade 4 will be provided Rs 5,000 each under the federal conditional mountain residential hostel grant program, said KC.

According to him, the rural municipality provides a grant of four thousand rupees per student to the lower classes of National Basic, Jhinju Basic and Dibya Deep Secondary Schools of Lomanthang.

Like Lomanthang of Upper Mustang, three community schools and two monasteries under Loghekar Damodar Kunda Rural Municipality have come down to the valley on October 26 to escape the cold, said Education Section Officer Prachanda Neupane.

According to Neupane, 16 schools of Charang Basic Charang of Loghekar Damodar Kunda, 56 schools of Ghami Basic Ghami and 84 schools of Janajyoti Basic Ghiling have been transferred to different places of Pokhara for continuing teaching and learning.

Charang basic has been shifted to Pokhara Hemja, Ghami basic has been shifted to Pokhara Bijayapur and Janajyoti basic has been shifted to Shukla Gandaki Dulegauda of Tanahun. According to Neupane, each school will receive Rs 350,000 under the title of Mobile School Operation and Management Program.

Similarly, the rural municipality has allocated a lump sum budget of Rs 25 lakh for the community schools as there is a lack of budget to run mobile classes in the valley during the winter months, said Neupane.

Similarly, three community schools in Loghekar and two monasteries of Charang have also come down to the valley to escape the cold, said Neupane.

According to Rekha Panta, education section officer of Baragung Mukti Kshetra, the school used to come down to the valley to escape the cold till last year. However, Kagchhode Monastery School at Kagbeni has been shifted to Besi to run mobile classes, said Officer Panta.

According to Panta, it has been decided not to run the mobile classes from the rural municipality as it would be difficult to deduct the leave of teachers due to continuous winter classes and the grant of Rs 350,000 provided by the federal government would not be able to bear the rotating expenses.

The government and religious monastery schools in Upper Mustang will continue to conduct classes as mobile classes. Students may fall ill with cold, cough and pneumonia while conducting classes in the previous location in the winter.

However, in Upper Mustang, most of the parents of the school go to the valley to escape the cold and for the mobile business, so the upper municipalities have been lowering their schools to the valley. The mobile schools, which have come down to avoid the cold, go up in the month of Baisakh to run the new academic session in the same place after the current academic session.

The community and institutional schools in Waragung, Gharpajhong and Thasang rural municipalities have been given winter vacations during the months of Poush and January.

In this way, the schools that are closed in the winter are open in the first week of February. Teachers in the lower three municipalities have been given a 45-day winter vacation and 15 days of substitute leave for two months.