Chennai: As
many as 141 elementary, high and higher secondary schools in the city
corporation’s extended areas, such as Perungudi, Tiruvo­tri­yur, Manali,
Ambattur and Madhavaram, still function under the school education
department even after the city corporation had requested it to hand them
over.

According to Ripon Buil­ding sources, the top brass
of the city corporation had sent a proposal to the state government for
transfer of control. “We had submitted the proposal an year ago as the
state government ext­ended our jurisdiction to include Chennai’s
suburbs, including Perungudi, Tiru­votriyur, Manali, Ambattur and
Madhavaram.

We are still waiting for the government’s nod to get
these 141 schools under our control as we need to allot posts of
existing teachers and headmasters as the new system is a cumbersome
one,” a senior official said.

At present, the city corporation
administers over 310 schools (elementary, high and higher) with a
student strength of 98,857 and 4,041 teachers.

“The city
corporation has been providing several schemes to meritorious students,
including financial assistance to Class XII students, `25,000 every year
for those who joined professional courses, such as MBBS and BE.

Even
as the state’s school education department had been implementing
various student welfare schemes in the 141 schools in the extended
areas, we want to supplement them with our incentives,” the official
said.

When asked about the city corporation’s proposal, a senior
school education department official said that as it involved policy
decisions to be taken at the State government’s level, they were
clueless about the proposal.