With schools reopening for the new academic year, institutions following the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) in Tiruchi are facing a shortage of printed textbooks of certain subjects in Class IX, putting students and teachers in a quandary.CBSE schools rely on textbooks issued by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT), the apex body for designing school curricula from Classes I to XII.The delay in the rollout of a new syllabus for Class IX in keeping with New Education Policy 2020, is said to have caused the shortage of textbooks, in subjects such as Social Studies, History and Mathematics this year.Leading sellers of academic books in Tiruchi said that they did not have this year’s Class IX textbooks on their inventory because of the short supply.Chapters of the new textbooks are available for free download through its official online channels.“Most CBSE schools tend to finish the Class IX syllabus early and begin Class X portions within the same year, to give students enough time to prepare for the board exams when they actually start Class X. However, we are not sure how things will be handled this time because Class IX Social Studies and Maths textbooks are not available. We are managing with printed photocopies and PDF documents online, but it is not the same as studying from a textbook,” said a parent with of a Class IX student in a city school.The academic coordinator of a CBSE school in Bharathi Nagar said that most secondary school teachers were still awaiting instructions on study plans for the new year.“Before introducing syllabus changes, the teachers should have been given a detailed orientation about the new curriculum. In the current scenario, school teachers are trying to do their own research and conduct classes with the available material. We cannot guarantee how effectively the students will learn like this,” she added. Published - June 19, 2026 07:06 pm IST