Why schools in Kedarnath are going soundproof

Little Khushboo strains her eyes to look at the helicopter flying over her village Bhetsem at Narayankoti, situated around 45 km from Kedarnath. Till a few months ago, the whirring noise of the chopper would furrow the little girl’s brow. Not any more. She waves cheerily at the helicopter taking pilgrims to the Kedarnath shrine and then with a hop, skip and jump enters her newly-built classroom fitted with windows made of soundproof glass.

In one of the first such initiatives anywhere in the Uttarakhand hills, classrooms in nine government schools in Rudraprayag district — which falls on the route that choppers take to go to the Kedarnath shrine during the six-monthlong Char Dham Yatra — are being made soundproof by the heli-companies operating on these routes.

This comes after students of the government schools situated near Kedarnath at places like Phata, Guptkashi, Gaurikund, Sonprayag and Narayankoti complained that excessive noise from the choppers — which make at least 60 trips in a day — was drowning out their teachers’ voices and causing difficulties for them in concentrating on their lessons.


Taking cognisance of their concerns, the district administration of Rudraprayag approached the heli-companies to try and work out a solution. After several rounds of discussions, eventually the heli-companies decided to sponsor 18 soundproof rooms for the nine schools whose students are worst-affected. “It was a major problem for the children especially those whose schools are located near the helipads. The noise from the choppers was so deafening that students could not sit in class. We finally convinced the helicopter operators to build soundproof classrooms in these schools by allocating money for the project through their CSR (corporate social responsibility) funds,” says Mangesh Ghildiyal, district magistrate of Rudraprayag.

He adds that “currently, two classrooms in each of the nine schools are being made soundproof and more will be added next year.” “The cost for making each room soundproof is around Rs 1.5 lakh,”says Ghildiyal.

Representatives of the heli-companies say that they are taking care to ensure that students have no further cause for complaint. “In the classroom that we have built at the Government Primary School in Bhetsem, we have replaced the old windows and doors which were earlier made of wood with modern ones. In addition, we have rebuilt the roof adding two layers of concrete so that minimum noise from outside enters the room,” says Colonel V R Sharma, an official of Aryan Aviation, one of the heli-companies involved in the project.

Teachers, too, are relieved. “For the past few years, taking classes has been a cumbersome exercise. We had to shout to make ourselves heard since helicopters were flying past our school almost every hour,” says Sanjay Prasad, headmaster of Government Primary School, Sirsi.

At the primary school in Bhetsem — where Khushboo studies — students say they look forward to attending classes in the new classroom that was inaugurated a few days ago. Himanshu Kumar, a student of class V says with a shy smile that he “likes coming to school now.” “Earlier, I felt like running away from school as I couldn’t listen to what the teacher was saying. But the new classroom is nice. I feel like studying here.”