Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel on Tuesday launched an e-learning platform "Padhai Tunhar Dwar", taking an innovative step to teach school children at home during the nationwide lockdown in the wake of the novel coronavirus outbreak.

Rs Rs With the help of the portal, lakhs of students of the state will get online education’’, Baghel said, adding that the program will prove extremely beneficial in ensuring uninterrupted education of children not only during the lockdown period but also in the near future.

CM interacted online with a Class-8 girl student from Tilda in Raipur district and a primary school teacher from Patan block in Durg district. Baghel congratulated the team of the education department for their initiative.

State minister of school education Dr Premsay Singh Tekam, principal secretary school education department Dr Alok Shukla, Director, Public Instruction Jitendra Kumar Shukla were present on the occasion.

The CM said now any teacher can teach students of not only one school, but schools in the entire state, through the online platform.

Schools across the state have been closed for a long time due to the lockdown to prevent infection of the coronavirus outbreak, Baghel said.

“For this reason, it has become necessary that children should be provided the opportunity to read, write and learn, while staying in their homes’’, he remarked.

“The state school education department has launched the facility of 'Padhai Tunhar Dwar' e-platform in the larger interest of the students.

“With this, students will now be able to continue their studies on the e-platform. This portal will be utilised after lockdown period as well for improving quality of education.”

“ Through the e-learning platform, teachers and children will be able to connect via video conferencing for online interactive classes and this will be the first major online education platform of its kind in the country, which will be very beneficial for the students of Chhattisgarh as well as students of other Hindi speaking states, the CM further stated.

More than 40,000 people visited the portal on the first day of its launching on Monday and hundreds of teachers and students have registered themselves and more than 150 videos and other course materials have also been uploaded.

The portal for the online studies has been developed by the state education department with the help of NIC.

Learning resources for students from Class-I to Class 10 have been made available on the website of the department of school education, cgschool.in.

It will be further expanded, after which the facility will be available to students of Class 11 and Class 12.