KOLKATA: Several schools, colleges and
universities
across the city and its outskirts on Wednesday suspended online classes and postponed end-semester examinations, anticipating disruption in cellphone and internet
connectivity
due to
Yaas. Those working from home, too, made arrangements, having learnt a lesson from the challenges they faced after Amphan.
Although some schools have gone into summer vacation, institutes, including South Point School, Vivekananda Mission School and Jadavpur University, called off virtual classes on Wednesday and deferred examinations slated for Wednesday and Thursday. “Since the disruption caused by Yaas could have hampered online classes, we decided to declare a holiday on Wednesday,” said Krishna Damani, spokesperson of South Point School. The school will adjust the missed classes on other dates, he added.
Sarmistha Banerjee, principal of Vivekananda Mission School, said there was a massive disturbance in internet connectivity. “We had received complaints from teachers and students about erratic connection. There was no point in continuing classes on Wednesday. The scheduled classes and topics will be taught on another date,” she said.
Abhirup Sengupta, a second-year UG student at Adamas University, thanked his institution for pushing back end-semester exams scheduled on Wednesday and Thursday.
The JU authorities on Wednesday sent a note to its engineering department heads, requesting them to “consider” cases of students who were unable to appear online for Wednesday’s examinations. At JU, examinations in the engineering faculty had to be cancelled at the last minute on Tuesday as a holiday was announced for Buddha Purnima. Partha Pratim Ray of the physics department said online classes in the faculty have been suspended till Thursday due to network issues across Yaas-hit districts.
Debnil Paul, a student of
Presidency University
, confirmed that while some UG and PG departments had suspended classes due to the cyclone, others had announced a holiday due to Buddha Purnima.
WFH executives like Santanu Mitra had taken requisite measures in advance. Mitra, who works as a senior data analyst at MOL-IT India, hired a mini-generator to avoid interruption in broadband connection at his Behala home.
However, none of the cellular service providers in the city and adjacent districts has reported any significant disruption across their networks. Questions sent to the Cellular Operators’ Association of India (COAI) and its members didn’t elicit any response. Reliance Jio has sent a precautionary update saying, “In view of cyclone Yaas, your
JioFiber services might get impacted.”
“Till evening, only a small percentage of our sites were reported to have been affected, thanks to our preparedness. Our teams are working on them and the network in these pockets will be restored at the earliest,” said Palash Paul, a network engineer working for a telecom infrastructure provider.