Hyderabad, Nov. 1 -- After every holiday, the compound of the Mandal Parishad Primary School (MPPS) in Shamirpet, on Hyderabad's outskirts, is strewn with beer bottles, plastic cups, cigarette butts and Ganja stubs. A classroom tablet has been stolen, windows smashed and an almirah forced open for cash. Vandals set fire to the motor that supplies the school's water and broke its banner. Trespassing here is routine.

"I don't know why all of this has to fall on me. It's all too hard," said Manaswini (name changed), who teaches there. When she asked the police for security cameras, "they installed them so far out on the road that they don't cover the walls the robbers use to climb over." She paid for the motor's repair herself.

A ground su...