53 of 54 UPA-era Kendriya Vidyalayas take off except in Rahul Gandhi’s Amethi

NEW DELHI: The UPA government had announced 54 new Kendriya Vidyalayas across the country at the last leg of its term in 2014. Four years later, all the promised schools have come up, save the one in Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s constituency, Amethi.

The KV in Amethi is yet to take off as it is caught in land allocation issues with at least three different plots allocated for the school and then rejected. Incidentally, 30 of the 54 KVs announced by UPA were in constituencies of Congress leaders, including one in Rae Bareli ––UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi’s constituency.

The story of Amethi KV started with land being identified and allocated in Jayas area under the UPA-II regime. The script changed when the government changed at the Centre and Smriti Irani, who had contested the polls against Gandhi in Amethi, became the HRD minister, Congress sources point out.


A new location for KV was suggested in Gauriganj in 2015 but even that was held up. Later, in the same year, a new location –– Khalispur in Tiloi area –– was identified. It is learnt that this was not found suitable by the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan (KVS) –– the central schools’ headquarters that falls under the HRD ministry.

Sources in KVS told ET that the reason for this inordinate delay is purely administrative as land suited for a KV was yet to be identified. The KVS claims that it has been in touch with the district administration on the issue. The KVS Commissioner did not respond to ET’s queries on the subject.

Amethi District Magistrate Shakuntala Gautam told ET that land has been identified now at Tala and it was for the KVS to proceed ahead now.
“We identified land at Tala and conveyed this to KVS 2-3 months back. Nothing is pending at our end”, Gautam told ET.

Amethi MP Rahul Gandhi’s team claimed that it has repeatedly taken up the issue with all the stakeholders.

“We have been taking this issue up repeatedly ever since the KV was announced in 2014. Land in Jayas was identified, we even managed to get space for a temporary campus. When the Central government changed, the district administration suddenly moved a new proposal to house the KV in Gauriganj area. Then, a third proposal came for Tala, off Rae Bareilly-Amethi border. None of this has taken off as of date for inexplicable reasons and despite constantly pursuing it. We do not mind any location,” Dhiraj Srivastava, senior team member at the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, who closely tracks the works in the constituencies of Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi, told ET.

Srivastava dismissed allegations that Gandhi not investing enough time and effort in his constituency’s development.

“That is not true. It is just propaganda by certain political quarters. Even as recently as 15th January 2018, Rahul Gandhi took it up at the District Vigilance and Monitoring Committee of Amethi, pointing out how the Amethi KV could have churned out five batches of students by now if it had been set up in time. The Amethi Chief Development Officer Rahul Singh also the noted that while land had been approved and allocated for the KV back in 2014 and permission for a temporary campus was given, it is a violation that no work has begun still,” he said.