AHMEDABAD: This is an ironclad irony. Two sets of people are simultaneously asking for donations in the name of Sardar Patel. The first is chief minister Narendra Modi who is promising to build the world’s tallest statue — that of the Sardar — with scrap donated from villages across the country. The other set is trustees of the primary school in Karamsad where Sardar studied from standard I to III. It needs a government grant to refurbish the rundown structure and turn it into a memorial to the real Iron Man of India.

But while Modi needs about Rs 2,000 crore to build the statue, the Kasramsad school needs a measly Rs 25 lakh but that the government is refusing to open its purse strings!

The state government had handed over the school campus to the Sardar Patel Trust, Karamsad, for restoration in 2000, but it has only turned to a garbage dump yard over the years.

A foul stench emanates from every corner and wild plants have grown everywhere . All that remains of the classrooms is crumbling walls. The trust planned a community centre and primary school here.

TOI has copies of the letters that the trust has written to the government for grant in which education department officials have flatly refused any help. In a letter written on February 4, 2006, director of primary education R C Rawal has stated that there is no provision for such a grant.

Anjali Harolikar, administrator of the trust, says, “The building was leased to us for 30 years. We have submitted a detailed proposal of restoration of the primary school building with estimated cost with map but the government has refused to help.”

Even the then education minister, Anandiben Patel, had written a letter to Modi in 2001 asking him to sanction the grant but it seems to have been lost in bureaucratic maze. Local BJP MPs and MLAs have also written to the government on the issue.

