Page 50 - EW March 2021

Cover Story

Centre’s grudging education outlays

3.8 3.7
3.6
3.5
3.3 3.3

2.7
2.5

0.49 0.47 0.47 0.43 0.44 0.44 0.44 0.42

2015-16 2016-17 2017-18 2018-19 2019-20 2020-21 2020-21 2021-22
(A) (A) (A) (A) (A) (BE) (RE) (BE)

A s % o f U nio n Budget A s % o f G D P

:
N B A = actual BE= b udgeted e p enditure R E= revised e p enditure Source: Compiled by CBGA from Union Budget documents
x
x
detailed five-year plans by subservi- state government’s education minis-
ent economists, contemporary India try. Moreover, almost all state govern-
hosts the world’s largest number of ments have imposed arbitrary tuition
comprehensively adult illiterates (300 fee ceilings on private schools. During
million); 56 percent of children in ru- the pandemic instead of providing fi-
ral (especially government) primaries nancial aid and assistance to private
cannot read class II textbooks and/or schools that have switched to online
solve simple arithmetic sums; only learning, they have advised parents
69 percent of children enter higher to desist from paying duly contracted
secondary school and the GER (gross fees even while mandating payment of
enrolment ratio) in higher education teachers’ salaries. As a growing num-
is a mere 30 percent (cf. 84 percent ber of private schools, particularly pre-
in South Korea) and industry, agricul- primaries and BPS shut down across
ture and government productivity is the country, the biggest losers will be
among the lowest worldwide. Budget private school classroom the 119 million children enrolled in
T dismal scenario is that free-of-charge government schools out of employment.
them and millions of teachers thrown
HE ROOT CAUSE OF THIS
With Budget 2021-22 having made
despite
education of the world’s largest child
private schools (BPS). Yet instead of
commissions
powered several high- into 400,000 fees-levying budget no special provision for continuing
and committees starting with the reforming and upgrading the coun- and youth population and discourag-
Kothari Commission (1967) having try’s 1.20 million government schools, ing philanthropic and for-profit in-
recommended investment of 6 per- successive Central and state govern- vestment in education, the country’s
cent of GDP in public education, for ments have brazenly restricted the much-trumpeted demographic divi-
the past six decades it has averaged promotion of private schools, espe- dend is rapidly transforming into a de-
3.25 percent. Consequently, govern- cially BPS. mographic disaster, as armies of youth
ment schools have become notorious According to the Central Square unqualified for the demands of 21st
I
for crumbling infrastructure, multi- Foundation’s Private S chools in ndia century workplaces are streaming out
2
grade classrooms, English language R ep ort 0 2 0 referred to above, estab- of sub-standard education institutions
aversion, wonky teacher-pupil ratios lishing a greenfield private school in to swell the ranks of the unemployed.
and pathetic learning outcomes. Delhi state requires submission of Intelligent monitors of India’s lan-
These factors have coalesced to 125 documents in approved formats guishing education sector are particu-
provoke an exodus of children from to be cleared by 40 officials in the larly disappointed that the BJP gov-

50 EDUCATIONWORLD MARCH 2021