The aim of education is not the acquisition of information, although important, or acquisition of technical skills, though essential in modern society, but the development of that bent of mind, that attitude of reason, that spirit of democracy which will make us responsible citizens- Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan
Introduction: Education is a fundamental human right, essential for the empowerment and development of an individual and the society as a whole. According to the UNESCOs Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2010, about 135 countries have constitutional provision for free and non- discriminatory education for all. In 1950, India made a Constitutional commitment to provide free and compulsory education to all children up to the age of 14, by adding this provision in article 45 of the directive principles of state policy. With the 86th Constitutional amendment on 12th December 2002, Article 21A was amended by the Constitution in order to introduce Right to Education as a fundamental right. The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act finally came into force on 1st April 2010. The Act provides for free and compulsory education to all children in the age group of six to fourteen years. It is now a legally enforceable duty of the Centre and the states, to provide free and compulsory education.
History: 1950: Constitution of India contained Article 45, as one of the directive principles of State policy, which states that: "The State shall endeavor to provide within a period of ten years from the commencement of this Constitution, for free and compulsory education for all children until they complete the age of fourteen years." 1968: First National Commission for education under Dr. Kothari submits its reports. It introduced several far-reaching changes as uniform curriculum for both boys and girls, mathematics and science as compulsory subjects etc. It also proposed a Common School System. 1976: Constitution amendment making education a concurrent subject (responsibility of both state and center) was passed. 1986: National policy on Education (NPE) endorsing Common School System (CSS) was formulated. Subsequent NPEs endorsed CSS but it has never been implemented. 1993: The Supreme Court in the case Unni Krishnan vs State of Andhra Pradesh ruled that the right to education is a fundamental right that flows from the Right to life in Article 21 of the Constitution. 1997: Constitution Amendment making Education a fundamental right was introduced. 2002: 86th Constitution Amendment added Article 21A stating that The State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age six to fourteen years in such as a way as the State may, by law, determine. The 86th Amendment also modified Article 45 which reads as The state shall endeavor to provide early childhood care and education for all children until they complete the age of 6 years. 2005: CABE committee report constituted to draft the Right to Education Bill submits its report. July 2006: Media reports indicate that federal government is planning to ask all state governments to pass Right to Education bill in their respective legislatures based on a model bill drafted by federal Government. It has shelved plans to introduce a federal bill in this regard. 4 August 2009: Right to Education Act (RTE) was enacted by the Parliament of India 1 April 2010: India became one of 135 countries to make education a fundamental right of every child when Right to Education act came into force. Aims and Objectives: Free and compulsory education to all children of India in the 6 to 14 age group. No child shall be held back, expelled, or required to pass a board examination until completion of elementary education. If a child above six years of age has not been admitted in any school or though admitted, could not complete his or her elementary education, then, he or she shall be admitted in a class appropriate to his or her age; Provided that where a child is directly admitted in a class appropriate to his or her age, then, he or she shall, in order to be at par with others, have a right to receive special training, in such manner, and within such time- limits, as may be prescribed: Provided further that a child so admitted to elementary education shall be entitled to free education till completion of elementary education even after fourteen years. Proof of age for admission: For the purposes of admission to elementary education age of a child shall be determined on the basis of the birth certificate issued in accordance with the provisions of the Births. Deaths and Marriages Registration Act, 1856 or on the basis of such other document, as may be prescribed. No child shall be denied admission in a school for lack of age proof. A child who completes elementary education shall be awarded a certificate. Will apply to all states of India except Jammu and Kashmir. Mandates improvement in quality of education. School teachers will need adequate professional degree within five years or else will lose job. School infrastructure (where there is problem) to be improved in three years, else recognition canceled. Financial burden will be shared between state and central government. Private schools will have to take 25% of their class strength from the weaker section and the disadvantaged group of the society through a random selection process. Government will fund education of these children. No seats in this quota can be left vacant. These children will be treated on par with all the other children in the school and subsidized by the State at the rate of average per learner costs in the government schools (unless the per learner costs in the private school are lower). All schools will have to prescribe to norms and standards laid out in the Act and no school that does not fulfill these standards within 3 years will be allowed to function. All private schools will have to apply for recognition, failing which they will be penalized to the tune of Rs 1 lakh and if they still continue to function will be liable to pay Rs 10,000 per day as fine. Norms and standards of teacher qualification and training are also being laid down by an Academic Authority. Teachers in all schools will have to subscribe to these norms within 5 years. There is also a reference of children with disabilities in the Act, who are to be given elementary education in the age range of 6-18 years. No donation and capitation fee is allowed. No admission test or interview either for child or parents. No child can be held back, expelled and required to pass the board examination till the completion of elementary education. There is provision for establishment of commissions to supervise the implementation of the act. A fixed student and teacher ratio is to be maintained. All schools have to adhere to rules and regulations laid down in this act, failing which the school will not be allowed to function. Three years moratorium period has been provided to school to implement all that is required of them. Norms for teachers training and qualifications are also clearly mentioned in the act. All schools except private unaided schools are to be managed by School management Committees with 75% of parents and guardians as members. Reviews by Jayanta Ghosh: The Bill needs to bring into its ambit all children in the age group of 3-16 years. It ignores children who are below 6 yrs. of age. With heightened political consciousness amongst the deprived and marginalized, never in the history of India has the demand for inclusive education been as fervent as today. Yet even a cursory examination of the proposed Act shows some glaring shortcomings. Like the age of the child. As a signatory to the UN Child Rights Convention, India has accepted the international definition of a child, which is up to age 18. The Act proposes to cover only children from age 6 to 14, clearly excluding and violating the rights of the 0-6 and 14 to 18 year olds. This problem can be traced to the 86th Amendment Act18 and its article 21A, which defines the age from 6 to 14. A contradiction lies between the two section of the said Act, Section- 2(f) & Section 11 on the term elementary education. By describing the word elementary education of a child means the education from first class to eight classes; [under sec- 2(f)] 20. Section 11 of the RTE Act, 2009 makes provision for being engaged with pre-school education. It states: With a view to prepare children above the age of three years for elementary education and to provide early childhood care and education for all children until they complete the age of six years, the appropriate Government may make necessary arrangement for providing free pre-school education for such children. Is education really free under RTE? The basic aspect of access is the provision of a school in the proximity of a child, since there are still areas in the country where such access is lacking. The Act envisages that each child must have access to a neighborhood school within three years from the time the Act is notified as an act. The presence of a nearby school is, however, no guarantee that a child can indeed access it. One of the key barriers, particularly for the poor and the deprived, is the issue of cost. That is where one of the critical aspects of Article 21A comes into play, namely, the state shall provide free education. Normally, free is interpreted as non- payment of fees by the parents of the child. But numerous studies have concluded that the fee constitutes only one of the components of educational expenditure. And since the landless, poor and socially deprived cannot meet the other expenses, this result in the non-participation of their children in education. These other expenses differ from place to place, though uniforms, copies and books and so on are perhaps common. The Act defines free education to mean any fee, expense or expenditure that keeps a child from participating in education, and obliges the state to provide all these. This broader definition, with implications for higher expenditure by the state, appears to be a better way to meet the challenge of access in terms of costs, rather than providing a list of items that will be covered, which are difficult to anticipate in different locations and in the future and hence cannot be exhaustive. Is quality education available to all under RTE? Sustained participation in schooling is, however, equally influenced by the quality of access. The high non retention rates in spite of higher enrolments in recent years are a clear indication that concerns of quality cannot be postponed till access is guaranteed, as also by the increasing tendency to seek out questionable private schools perceiving their quality to be better. The approach of providing schooling through education guarantee centers and untrained para teachers has also greatly exacerbated the problem of quality of government schools ever since the District Primary Education Programme pioneered this cost-cutting strategy, further expanded through the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) in many states of the country. This approach has resulted in making education more iniquitous, since the government system itself now has a variety of streams the EGS centre, the rundown rural or Basti School, the alternative school, the Kendriya, Sarvodaya, Navodaya and other kinds of schools and so on22. Clearly, access to each is determined according to the social and class background of children, thus segregating them further. Consequently, the social integration that education was expected to assist, by bringing children from diverse backgrounds together in the same classrooms, has been allowed instead, one may say deliberately, to experience higher degrees of fragmentation. No wonder then that an increasing number of parents, both urban and rural, despite great financial difficulties, are attracted to the option of purchasing education from private profit-making schools that seem to have external frills of quality and regular presence of teachers. While ensuring that every child who traverses through the elementary education system acquires a certificate of completion, the Act fails to guarantee that a child has acquired competencies deriving from said education process. No standards are set for learning outcomes. A case of guaranteeing graduation but not education. Failure of the child to attest to acquisition of competencies is also not flagged for remedial action and systemic enhancements. The Act should also define a framework to measure the quality of education imparted, without creative and regular assessments, quality of education cannot be guaranteed. Reservation @ 25% in Private Schools- Why? The proponents of the Act, especially the internationally funded NGOs, make much out of the provision of 25% reservation in the private schools for the disadvantaged children. Closer examination reveals a different story. As per the Seventh Educational Survey, about four crore children out of 19 crore in the 6-14 age group are currently studying in private schools at the elementary stage (class I-VIII). The above provision will create space for one crore for which the private schools will be reimbursed for the tuition fees. Assuming that these schools are providing quality education, the provision helps only a minority of the underprivileged. What is then the Act vision of quality education for the remaining 15 crores? They will continue to receive education through a multi-layered school system with each social segment in a separate layer, the much-acclaimed norms and standards in the Bills Schedule notwithstanding. Back to the 25% provision, everybody knows that, apart from the tuition fees, the private school child has to shell out money for a range of items throughout the year expensive uniform and shoes, extra textbooks, picnic and extra-curricular charges, computer fees etc. Who will pay for that? Why has the Act not thought of changing the elitist character of these schools that violate the educational principles enunciated by Phule, Tagore and Gandhi? Clearly, the Act lacks the vision of what constitutes quality in relation to Indias needs. That, however, is another debate.
Availability of Teachers and Required Pupil-Teacher Ratio: Five lakhs new teachers are to be recruited and 5 lakhs new classrooms are to be constructed to meet the required 30:1 pupil teacher ratio. There are seven lakhs teachers in the recognized 13 lakhs primary schools. Out of these, three lakhs teachers are either untrained or under-training. In many states large numbers of teachers are para-teachers and many of them are untrained. As per a recent report by NUEPA, Bihar tops amongst the states having poor pupil-teacher ratio and Uttar Pradesh comes at second place. In about 35 percent primary schools in Uttar Pradesh, pupil teacher ratio is 60:1. Fifty one percent primary schools in Uttar Pradesh are having three or less number of teachers. Out of these, 38 percent are para-teachers. In the present circumstances, to maintain pupil-teacher ratio as per the Act, appears a distant dream.
Who will implement and monitor the child rights? The Act is silent on the aspect of actual competence of and quality of monitoring by the national and state commissions for protection of child rights. While the provisions provide that an aggrieved person may lodge a complaint with the local authority, there is an obvious problem in this clause, since the very same body that is responsible for ensuring protection of the rights of the child is also made responsible for deciding upon a complaint against it. The Act is silent on the state parties that will be held responsible if its implementation is found lackadaisical. Can there be a Fundamental Right to unequal and inferior education? The central governments audible answer: Yes, indeed! Professor Amartya Sen told the Confederation of Indian Industries in December 2007 that school education can be funded only by the state. No advanced country in the world has ever been able to provide universal quality education by negating or undervaluing its public- funded education system. This is true for all the G-8 countries, including the USA. Defying this universal experience, the Right to Education Act is daring to undo the history.
In order to meet the challenges and surmount the hurdles that stand in the way of implementing Right to Education Act, it is needful to concentrate all efforts with full dedication and commitment. Not only the central and state governments but the nation as a whole should take responsibility in this regard. Community participation and support can make marked difference in achieving this goal. There exists a need for greater coordination amongst different agencies and functionaries involved in this task. To overcome population pressures and budgetary constraints, cost effectiveness and accountability must be ascertained at every level. Efforts should be focused on qualitative improvement of the whole programme. Study by R.B.L.Soni: The Right of children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009 passed by the Indian Parliament mandates free and compulsory education of all children of 6-14 years age until they complete elementary education in a neighbourhood school. However, there is an important concern over implementation of RTE Act in the school system with reference to the special training or instruction, its modalities and execution for children admitted under age-appropriate admission. The states are expected to respond to the situation arising out of the implementation of the Act. States and UTs are required to pay special attention to cope with the situation in terms of appointment of qualified teachers, development of special training programmes for out-of-school children admitted to age appropriate classes and preparation of relevant teaching learning materials for them. Similarly, there is an urgent need of taking appropriate steps for inclusive education of children with disabilities by providing teaching-learning materials, aids and appliances in accordance with nature and needs of each disability, suitable infrastructural modifications, training of regular teachers and school-based appointment of special teacher. There is also a need for organising programmes for community awareness and attitude change in order to make school for all children. Home-based education has to be given to children suffering from multi-disabilities, severe and profound disability conditions. Children belonging to disadvantaged groups, e.g. SC/ST/BPL, have specific economic and social problems and special focus is needed to ensure RTE to the children of these categories. Various categories of children with disabilities have special needs depending on the nature of disability. Therefore, special aids and appliances, educational materials, special teacher support and infrastructural modifications are required to ensure RTE to these children. Awareness of inclusive education at all levels - functionaries, head teachers/ teachers, parents and community - is of paramount importance and urgent steps in this direction are indispensable. Some of conclusions from the study: Functionaries and teachers at state, district and block levels were aware of provisions of RTE Act, 2009 to a great extent. Orientation of teachers for RTE (except for Orissa) did not include information about disadvantaged and children with disabilities. Parents were not aware of various provisions of RTE Act. All states/UTs have taken initiatives in conducting community awareness programmes to bring all children, including children with disabilities, to schools. Vigorous efforts are needed to create awareness in society for RTE. Volunteers conduct RTE awareness programmes for community in schools of AP. Untrained teachers in Jharkhand affect the quality of education. Scholarship scheme is not applicable to SC/ST/BPL children coming from other states to Gujarat. Asvaccha (untouchable) SC students of Gujarat receive good amount of scholarship. Other SC students of Gujarat also receive scholarship. SC and ST students in other states (except for Andhra Pradesh) receive scholarship. Children with various disabilities in Jharkhand did not receive scholarship amounts except for those who belonged to SC/ST categories. States/ UTs have plans to increase scholarship amount for disadvantaged and children with disabilities. There were very few cases of age appropriate admissions of disadvantage and children with disabilities. Orissa and Gujarat carried out systematic surveys for identification of non-enrolled and dropout children with disabilities. In most states/UTs, except in few schools of Gujarat and Puducherry, materials for training of children admitted under age appropriate placement in different classes were not available. Children of migrant labourers from Hindi speaking states, Gujarat, Kanada and Assam leave school in Kerala because of inadequate arrangements for age-appropriate training for placement in different classes. Teachers have not been trained to teach children admitted under age-appropriate admissions. These children were seated with high performing children so that they could pick up fast. Inclusive education resource teachers (IERTs) are appointed on contract basis and they are given multi-category training to deal with all types of disabilities in AP. Special teachers in various states are appointed on contract basis and special teacher visits children with disabilities once a week. Suitable ramps for wheelchair users were not available in most of the schools. Gujarat had better record in constructing ramps, but not all schools had suitable ramps. Disabled friendly toilets were available in very few schools of states/UTs. Educational materials for children with disabilities were non-existent in most sample schools. States/ UTs have very limited vision of arranging different types of educational materials for children with various disabilities. All states/UTs encourage parents of children with disabilities to bring them to Anganwadi centres. Children with no vision were not found in sample schools and it was informed that they are sent to special schools. Safety and security of children was at high risk in some sample schools of Jharkhand and Uttarakhand. Regular teachers have not been trained in the area of disabilities. Children with disabilities, especially visually impaired, have not been provided teaching- learning materials individually. Infrastructure in one school of Orissa was awful and the roof of almost all classrooms leaks during the rain. Consequently, there is no teaching for about one month, which is clearly hindrance to RTE of these children. There is a loss of teaching because of all children sitting together. There are no boundary walls and drinking water facilities. The quality of material used in wheelchairs was very bad, said respondents in Orissa and Uttarakhand. Braille books, aids and appliances were not supplied to Orissa and Uttarakhand by NIVH, Dehradun despite repeated reminders. In many states/UTs, broken/faulty aids and appliances are replaced after a period of one year hindering educational progress of the child. There are instances of individual initiatives to implement inclusive education in real sense. One principal in Gujarat admitted a girl with severe mental disability and persuaded teachers to help educating her. Notable 75% improvement in social skills was achieved by her in a period of five year; but academic improvement was up to class I. Somnath Trust, which receives enormous wealth from devotees, could take initiative in serving children with disabilities by opening special schools and serving them in other ways. This will be a greater service to humanity than simply performing devotional activities. Wheelchairs and tricycles cannot be used by children with locomotors disabilities due to difficult terrain in Almora district. However, these items are supplied there. Different items, such as special shoes, were supplied after one year of assessment in Uttarakhand resulting in inappropriate size due to growth of feet. Very often, same size of callipers was supplied, which could not be used by children. Complaint was sent to ALIMCO, but no satisfactory action was taken. Infrastructural facilities in both the districts of Uttarakhand, except in two schools of Nainital district, were non-existent. SSA authorities in Andaman and Nicobar Islands were reluctant to cooperate with the researcher and negligible cooperation was given in the study. In Puducherry, BRTs and CRTs were given training for monitoring and feedback, but they were posted back into their respective schools resulting in no monitoring and no feedback to teachers. Shortage of teachers, alarming pupil-teacher ratio, other official duties assigned to teachers, busyness in training programmes, duties in block level office, making Aadhar cards and voter ID Cards etc, no training of regular teachers in education of children with disabilities and non-availability of special teacher support on daily basis are challenges in the implementation of RTE. Poor infrastructure, non-availability of appropriate furniture for children with disabilities, non- availability of special aids and appliances, poor quality of aids and appliances for children with locomotors disabilities are major challenges in fulfilment of RTE to these children.
Some News Articles:
Times of India New Delhi dated June 30, 2012 brought out interesting facts. It reported that only 5 % of the schools were following RTE guidelines as stated by the convener of RTE Forum. Additionally, there were problems, such as shortage of 10,00,000 teachers, untrained teachers in some places, Para- teachers and student-teacher ratio.
Times of India New Delhi, dated July 2, 2012 reported an interview with Shri Ambrish Rai, National Convener of RTE Forum. Three questions were placed before him. These questions were 1. Where do we stand in terms of deadline for the implementation of the RTE Act? 2. What concrete steps were being taken by the RTE Forum in terms of mobilisation of people? 3. What about 25 % reservation in private schools? In response to the first question, Mr. Rai said that the Forum was struggling with problems in implementation of the Act at gross root level. He added that 95 % of schools were not complying with the RTE laws. Lack of teachers, infrastructural deficiencies for children with disabilities, violation of age- appropriate admissions were other issues that need urgent attention.Replying to the second question, Mr. Rai said that concrete steps were being taken to mobilise people through NGOs, teacher organisations and through campaigns at village and block levels. In response to the third question, he said that education is a social tool beyond the boundaries of rich and poor and private schools should fulfil their responsibilities. Indian express Hyderabad, Sep 21, 2013 reported the speech by Union HRD minister M Pallam Raju at the inauguration of the Aga Khan Academy on the outskirts of the city who said that the government aims to provide quality education and capacity building in the years to come. He claimed that 230 million children had been enrolled in schools ever since the Right to Education Act came into force. He said "Ever since the introduction of the Right to Education Act, which gives a fundamental right to every child in this country, in the last three years, we have enrolled a substantial number of children, brought them back to school. As a result, we have 230 million in schools today".
Hindustan Times Mumbai, August 08, 2013 brought out facts where with over 90% of city schools still to meet infrastructure norms required under the Right to Education Act (2009), the blacklisted schools have been given a second chance. The school education department has given the institutions two months to comply with these norms or else face de-recognition. As per the RTE act, schools were supposed to comply with ten infrastructure norms stipulated in the act by August 31, 2013. However, considering that 1,600 schools out of 1,703 in the city have not fulfilled the norms, the department gave them some extra time. Majority of the schools have not fulfilled these norms. It would be impractical to derecognize them all. Hence the extension has been given, said Mahavir Mane, state director of primary education. Hindustan Times Mumbai, July 20 2012reported that only 103 schools in the city had fulfilled the norms. Majority of the schools have missed implementing two to three norms like kitchen sheds, ramps, and pupil-teacher ratio, which schools say are difficult to follow practically. Mane added that individual schools will be given time depending on which infrastructure they need to build. Though relieved, some schools fear, the time given might not be sufficient. Even schools that have been pulled up for not having big classrooms will not be able to meet this deadline. The RTE requires classrooms to be at least 400 square feet, but most city schools have only 300 to 350 square feet. The BMC is not giving permission to expand the classrooms. Most of the classrooms are built according to the rules before RTE, said Prashant Redij, vice president of the association of private schools. Schools that do not upgrade their infrastructure in the time given will have to pay a fine up to Rs. 10,000 per day and could lose their recognition.
Indian Express Ahmedabad, Mon Jan 16 2012 reported a survey in schools and an interview with the chairperson of school board about RTE Act hitting student-teacher ratio after the introduction of Right to Education (RTE) Act. The student-teacher ratio disturbed the equilibrium in municipal corporation-run schools in Ahmedabad leading to a shortage of nearly 500 teachers, he said. Nearly 100 teachers are required in Urdu medium schools because many from Urdu schools, despite existing shortage, have been moved to Gujarati medium schools. The situation is precarious particularly in Urdu and other language mediums because of the special nature of language skills of their staff. Again, their appointments in Gujarati medium schools are also of no use because they do not possess necessary teaching skills in that language, pointed out teachers teaching in those schools. References: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2231197&download=yes http://ssa.nic.in/rte-1/RTE%20Final%20book_11-04-12%20-%20Low%20resolution.pdf http://www.ncert.nic.in/departments/nie/dee/publication/pdf/StatusreportRTE2013.pdf http://www.ashanet.org/campaigns/rte/docs/rte_campaign_asha-sv_ppt.pdf http://www.ashanet.org/campaigns/rte/
Group Members: Group Number: 1 Group members: G Vamshi Kumar Reddy , CS12B010 B Sai Jayanth , CS12B036 A Praneeth Kumar Reddy , EE12B002 Ch Anvesh Reddy , CE12B014