Education of over 4.5 lakh students in flood-hit seven upazials of Satkhira district is being hampered as most of the institutions, inundated on August 2, are still waterlogged.

Besides, a large number of educational institutions in the upazilas are being used as temporary shelters for the affected people.

Following heavy rainfall, silted Kabodak and Betna rivers overflowed their banks, flooding Tala, Satkhira Sadar, Assassuni, Debhata and Kalaroa, Kaliganj and Shyamnagar upazilas.

Around382 school, 30 madrasas and 21 colleges in the upazilas are either waterlogged or being used as temporary shelters for the affected people.

District primary education office sources said 48 primary schools in Tala upazila, 56 in Sadar upazila, 26 in Assassuni upazila, 19 in Debhata upazila, seven in Kalaroa upazila, two in Kaliganj upazila, and 26

schools in Shyamnagar upazila are still under water.

As many as 45 primary schools in Tala upazila, 25 in Sadar upazila, 26 in Assassuni upazila, 10 in Debhata upazila, and four in Kalaroa upazila have been made temporary shelters, sources added.

Education of students at most of the institutions in the seven upazilas are being greatly hampered as flood waters have not yet receded from the schools, sources further said.

District Primary Education Officer (DPO) Panjhanon Bala said over 126 primary schools have been made temporary shelters in the affected upazilas. “We have urged the flood victims to leave these institutions to resume academic activities, but to no effect," he said, adding that their houses were completely damaged by flood.

Our staff correspondent in Khulna reported that a team of senior officials of the Ministry ofWomen and Children

Affairs yesterday visited the flood affected areas of Shibpur, Majhiarah, Khayerdanga, Khanpur and Kismatghona under Tala upazila, Shubarnaghat, Baroshanta and other affected areas of Debhata Upazila of Satkhira district.

The team members talked to the flood-hit people and exchanged views on how to redress untold sufferings of the victims, particularly women and children.

The officials include Project Director of Empowerment and Protection of Children (EPC) Project Ashrafunessa, Assistant Project Director Md Hafizul Islam, Senior Assistant Secretary Suraiya Akhter Jahan, Prof Rezaul Karim, Shambhu Chowdhury and Hasina Begum.

Apart from seeing for themselves the relief distribution work, they also talked to the affected people on matters relating to prevention of women and child trafficking and dropouts of school going children.