Maharashtra: Adani Group acquires control of Mount Carmel School
Since September, the secondary school, which celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2022, has been entrusted to the foundation linked to the Indian tycoon. The sisters explain the decision by emphasising the different values and aims compared to a group whose priority is ‘commercial interests’. For this reason they ask that the inscription ‘Mount Carmel’ be removed from the façade.
Delhi (AsiaNews) - A decision that has caused deep shock and raised fierce institutional and confessional controversy, and which seems destined to continue in the coming weeks even though the margins for intervention are limited. At the centre of the controversy is the government measure that transferred the management and control of Mount Carmel Convent School in Ghugus, a secondary school in the district of Chandrapur, in the State of Maharashtra, to the Adani Foundation, linked to the tycoon Gautan Adani, an entrepreneur very close to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, at the head of a controversial empire with interests ranging from large infrastructures to the energy industry and the defence sector.
Critics and opponents of the decision taken through a measure dated 27 September wonder why - after more than 50 years in which this school was entrusted to the nuns of the Congregation of the Mother of Carmel - the management has now been hastily handed over to an entity linked to an industrial giant. The recurring and unresolved question is who would have made the proposal for the change and what would be the reasons for such a decision.
The institute's former headmistress, Sister Leena, confirms that she left the school on 1 September after it was sold to the Adani Group, because the nuns did not want to work under the directives of the Indian tycoon, whose ‘priority is commercial interests’, certainly not educational. Two ‘totally different’ policies prompted the nuns to leave, not before urging the new ownership to remove the ‘Mount Carmel’ sign, because they are no longer part of an institution with around 2,000 pupils and celebrating its golden jubilee in 2022.
In recent days, the Adani Foundation - which now runs and controls the school - has stated that the relocation of the institute, which was founded on the initiative of Acc Limited (a local Indian cement manufacturer, now part of the Adani Group), is linked to the nuns' decision to “discontinue” management. Consequently, in June 2023 Acc Ltd asked the Adani Foundation, a non-profit organisation, to take over. The transfer process, the note concludes, ‘complied with all required protocols and approvals’ issued by central and local government agencies.
In an attempt to legitimise the takeover, the Adani Foundation officials also claim that ‘the school has a great tradition, but at the same time is in desperate need of an infrastructure upgrade’, which the top management is said to have already begun with ‘key improvements’. These would include infrastructure development, better teacher training, and student support services. And work is also being done ‘to achieve Nabet accreditation by 2025’.
Words that are not enough, and do not serve, to extinguish the controversy. To AsiaNews Sister Grace Therese, superior general of the Congregation of the Mother of Carmel (Cms), a Syro-Malabar religious congregation, points out that the school has so far been self-financed and has offered education from first to twelfth grade. ‘Since the beginning of our congregation, our educational apostolate,’ the nun continues, ’has been of vital importance. Especially the education of girls in most rural areas and small towns, as well as in urban areas. Our schools emphasise values and our zeal for the educational apostolate continues'.
In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Shiv Sena Party (Ubt) MP Ambadas Danve addressed the government resolution (Gr) on the transfer, saying: ‘It seems that Maharashtra, once a leader in education, is now learning from the Adani Group. After transferring land and industries to Adani, the government is now giving away schools. This is a clear indication that the government is selling out Maharashtra'. Opposition leader Uddhav Thackeray also spoke on the issue: ‘I thought,’ he said, ‘that Adani's influence was limited to Mumbai, but now I learn that Mount Carmel School has been handed over to him. Can Adani be considered a national figure worthy of running our schools?’
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07/02/2019 17:28
