Page 20 - EW February 2023

Education News

income of Rs.165,371, 10 percent rural districts,” advises Seetharamu.
higher than the national per capita But with corruption, caste and re-
income of Rs.150,326 per year. ligious identity rhetoric dominating
According to media reports, the political discourse as the legisla-
education ministry officials derive a tive assembly election is a mere three
measure of pride from ASER 2022 months away, it’s doubtful that the
data which indicates that enrolment damning conclusions of ASER 2022,
in government schools has increased highlighting the pathetic condition
from 69.9 percent in 2018 to 72.6 of Karnataka’s rural schools, and
percent in 2022, reversing the trend the NIPUN programme will get any
of children migrating from govern- attention.
ment to private budget schools. Reshma Ravishanker (Bengaluru)
However, the authors of ASER
2022 attribute this phenomenon TAMIL NADU
to a substantial number of parents
who suffered job loss and financial Escalating conflict
distress during the Covid pandemic,
being obliged to send their children he war between tamil nadu’s
to free-of-charge government pri- DMK government and the BJP
maries where children also get a free Tgovernment at the Centre on
mid-day meal. education issues is intensifying. On
“Educating children is a triangular several issues including NEET (Na-
transaction involving child, teacher tional Eligibility cum Entrance Test), Education Policy (SEP) exclusively
and parent. The great majority of ru- a central exam for admission into for Tamil Nadu. The Seventh Sched-
ral parents are illiterate and unable medical colleges; CUET (Common ule of the Constitution of India lists
to provide children learning support University Entrance Test) for admis- 52 subjects on which both the Cen-
at home. That’s why even though sion into all Central government uni- tral and state governments can enact
the government did a good job of versities; three-languages learning legislation. Education is one of them.
reaching books and learning materi- in K-12 education and several provi- Therefore, the DMK government, now
als to children during the pandemic sions of the National Education Policy in the third year in office, believes it is
lockdown, in the absence of teach- (NEP) 2020 tabled in Parliament on entitled to enact its own SEP.
ers, they were unable to learn. This July 29, 2020, the Central and state According to academics and politi-
explains why 70 percent of class V governments are at loggerheads. cal pundits in Chennai, although DMK
children in rural schools, who have However, addressing the 34th con- supremo and chief minister M.K. Sta-
been automatically promoted for two vocation of the Avinashilingam Insti- lin has cited several differences with
years, can’t read textbooks of class tute for Home Science and Higher the Centre which prompted the state
II. They had to learn entirely on their Education for Women in Coimbatore government to constitute the Murug-
own or from equally deprived peers on January 21, Dharmendra Prad- esan Committee, the roots of the latest
for almost two years,” says Dr. A.S. han, Union education minister, ex- Centre-state stand-off can be traced to
Seetharamu, former professor of pressed hope that the DMK govern- the old issue of adamant opposition
education at the Institute of Social ment will cooperate with the Centre to Hindi being declared the national
& Economic Change (ISEC), Benga- in implementing NEP 2020. “Though language of India. Tamil Nadu’s op-
luru. education is in the concurrent list of position to the three-language policy
According to Dr. Seetharamu, the the Constitution and the state has the which obliges all school children to
best solution for the state govern- right to enact legislation, the Centre learn Hindi, English and the state
ment is to urgently implement the expects Tamil Nadu to accept NEP language, goes all the way back to the
Central government’s National Ini- 2020,” he said. pre-independence era.
tiative for Proficiency and Reading But this expectation is unlikely to In 1937, the first regional Congress
with Understanding and Numeracy be met. Last year on April 5, 2022, al- government elected under the govern-
(NIPUN), a supplementary after- most two years after NEP 2020 was ment of India Act, 1935 and headed
school programme. “NIPUN is a approved by Parliament, the DMK by stalwart C.R. Rajagopalachari,
well-designed learning programme government constituted a 13-mem- (aka Rajaji), issued a government
which should be immediately imple- ber committee chaired by D. Muru- order making Hindi language learn-
mented starting with gram pan- gesan, a former chief justice of the ing compulsory in state government
chayat schools in the most backward Delhi high court, to formulate a State schools. This prompted the rise of the

20 EDUCATIONWORLD FEBRUARY 2023