The Union Cabinet on Friday approved 85 new Kendriya Vidyalayas (KVs) and 28 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas (JNVs) worth Rs 8,231 crore for the biggest expansion of Kendriya Vidyalayas in a decade. The Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir will receive the highest number of new KVs (13), while Arunachal Pradesh will receive the highest number of JNVs (8).
KVs are for children of central government and defense personnel. JNVs, on the other hand, are residential schools (classes 6 to 12) established in rural districts to nurture talented students from rural areas.
Currently, apart from the one approved by the Union Cabinet on Friday, there are 1,256 functional KVs and 653 functional JNVs.
85 new Kendriya Vidyalayas will be established over a period of eight years from 2025-26, while 28 JNVs will be established over a period of five years from 2024-25 to 2028-29. Collectively, these schools are expected to create additional enrollment capacity for around one lakh students and create around 6,600 new employment positions, the government said on Friday.
Although the new KVs are spread across 19 states and Union Territories, a senior government official argued behind the districts selected for the new schools. “New central schools are built on the basis of demand, which means we usually set up a new school where there are at least 500 families of central government employees. For example, in Jammu and Kashmir, there are A large number has been approved to cater to the families of many CRPF personnel.To give you another example, in Andhra Pradesh we have approved a KV in a district where the Revenue Department new A training institute has been started,” the official told The Indian Express.
Besides J&K, Madhya Pradesh got 11 new KVs, followed by Rajasthan (9), Andhra Pradesh (8) and Odisha (8). Collectively, the above five states green-lighted more than half of the new KVs on Friday.
“For JNVs, a large number have been sanctioned for three northeastern states – Arunachal Pradesh, Assam and Manipur – a strategic objective to open more schools in states bordering the region,” the official said. 6 JNVs were cleared for Assam, Manipur got 3. Along with Arunachal Pradesh, they accounted for 17 of the 28 new JNVs.
The last two major batches of new KVs approved by the Center were in March 2019 (50) by the current government and in February 2014 (54) by the UPA government, just before the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. According to sources, although all these KVs have started working, some are operating from temporary premises.
“So this time, the Union Cabinet has decided that the new KV or the new JNV will not start functioning, not even from the temporary premises, until the land for the permanent campus of the institutions is handed over by the state government or the defense ministry. Whichever is applicable in the case,” said a government official.