Centre needs Rs 2.3 lakh crore to fund RTE initiative

April 14, 2012

rti

New Delhi, April 14 : With the Supreme Court bringing all recognized schools under the Right to Education (RTE) Act, the government will have to boost spending on its flagship programme to meet the estimated Rs 2.3 lakh crore needed to fund the initiative over 2010-2014.

RTE has been plagued with fund shortfalls with budgetary provision in the last two years being only half of what was estimated. The HRD ministry received Rs 21,000 crore in 2011-12 instead of Rs 43,903 crore. The allocation has gone up only marginally to Rs 25,000 crore in the current 2012-13 budget.

The estimated Rs 2.3 lakh crore, to be shared between Centre and states according to a 65:35 ratio, is also expected to go up as it does not include subsidy the government is to pay private schools to implement a 25% quota for economically disadvantaged students.

The RTE incorporates the successful Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) and the ministry had estimated it would need an allocation of Rs 48,000 crore in the current fiscal. Initially, the government had calculated that it would need Rs 40,500 crore in the first year of implementation.

According to educationist Vinod Raina, a key member of the RTE team, "RTE in general suffers from a financial crunch and there has also been a problem of states not being able to spend the funds allocated. There have also been constraints of teacher shortages.''

While RTE rollout has been hampered by a resource crunch and infrastructure bottlenecks for which the government has not always been to blame, targets set for UPA's ambitious programme of social inclusiveness have not been met. The erosion of gender imbalances and reduction of dropout rates are still lagging targets.

Implementation of RTE targets still needs 12 lakh teachers and HRD minister Kapil Sibal has said six lakh posts have been sanctioned that need to be filled. RTE sets an ideal 30:1 student-teacher ratio for primary schools.

The overall annual dropout rate for 2009-10 was 9.1% and this has improved to 6.8% in 2010-11. Total enrollment has increased to 13.52 crore from 13.34 crore in the same period. But worryingly dropout rates have increased in states like Tamil Nadu, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Mizoram, Sikkim and Tripura.

There are about 1.29 million elementary schools in the country. Besides funding, shortage of teachers is a crucial hurdle to implementing the Act. According to the ministry, 43% of government schools have a pupil: teacher ratio of more than 30:1. About 9% schools are run by single teachers, while 20% have teachers without professional qualifications. There is an estimated shortage of 12 lakh teachers in eight states, and the worst affected include UP, Bihar and West Bengal.

A recent PAISA report by Accountability Initiative has seconded the government's estimate that allocations to teachers, including salaries, training and teaching inputs such as teacher learning equipment, accounted for the largest share of the SSA budget.

In 2011-2012 teachers accounted for 44% of the budget. School infrastructure made up for the second largest share with a total allocation of 36%, while children (entitlement and special programmes) accounted for 10%.

While per child allocation has doubled from Rs 2, 004 in 2009-1010 to Rs 4, 269 in 2011-2012 the report says that a matching increase in quality parameters is absent. Raina says staggered targets depending upon progress of each state may be the answer to effective implementation.


Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
March 19,2024

ramadev.jpg

New Delhi, Mar 19: The Supreme Court today came down heavily on Patanjali Ayurved for failing to respond to a contempt notice for issuing misleading advertisements and ordered yoga guru Ramdev to appear before it.

A bench of Justices Hima Kohli and Ahsanuddin Amanullah also summoned Patanjali managing director Acharya Balkrishna.

The Supreme Court last month pulled up Patanjali for prima facie violation of its assurances about its products and statements claiming their medicinal efficacy. The court had issued a notice to Patanjali and Balkrishna, asking why contempt proceedings should not be initiated against them.

It noted today that Patanjali did not file a response even though it had held a press conference after its previous order. "Why haven't you filed your response yet? We will ask the managing director to appear in the court during the next hearing," the court said.

The order states both Ramdev and Balakrishna were prima facie in violation of Sections 3 and 4 of the Drugs and Remedies Act, which deal with misleading ads of medicines.

The court also issued a contempt notice to Ramdev, co-founder of Patanjali, and asked him to explain why he should not face action for contempt of court.

Senior lawyer Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Patanjali Ayurved, opposed the move and sought to know, "How Ramdev comes into the picture?"

"You are appearing. We will see on the next date. Enough," the court replied.

"We had our hands tied earlier but not now. As an officer of the court, you (Mr Rohatgi) should know your position," said Justice Amanullah.

The court was hearing a petition by the Indian Medical Association (IMA) alleging a smear campaign by Ramdev against the vaccination drive and modern medicines.

On February 27, it had issued a contempt notice to Patanjali and cautioned them against from making any statements against any system of medicine in the media. It had also pulled up the centre for not taking action and said they were sitting with their eyes closed.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
March 15,2024

SCSBI.jpg

New Delhi, Mar 13: The Supreme Court on Friday took exception to the State Bank of India (SBI) for not disclosing complete details of Electoral Bonds, including unique alfa numeric numbers, furnished to the Election Commission for uploading on the website.

A five-judge Constitution bench led by Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud issued notice to the SBI seeking its response on Monday after the court was informed that the issuing bank for the Electoral Bonds has not disclosed unique alfa numeric number of each bond.

"They have not disclosed the bond numbers. It has to be disclosed by the State Bank of India. All details have to be provided by the SBI," the bench, also comprising Justices Sanjiv Khanna, B R Gavai, J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra, noted.

Senior advocate Kapil Sibal said as per the Constitution bench judgment of February 15, 2024, all details were to be disclosed.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta submitted since the SBI was a party to the judgment, notice may be issued to it.

The court said the counsel for SBI should have been here.

"If you see the judgment, we have specified that bond numbers have to be provided," the bench said.

Advocate Prashant Bhushan appeared for the main petitioner Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

On an application by the EC, the bench said the details of Electoral Bonds furnished by the poll panel before the top court should be scanned and returned to it for the purpose of uploading on the website.

The Election Commission through advocate Amit Sharma filed a plea in the Supreme Court seeking a direction to release data on electoral bonds furnished to the top court in terms of previous orders of April 12, 2019 and November 2, 2023.

As per March 11, 2024 order, the Election Commission on Thursday uploaded the data on electoral bonds furnished to it by the SBI.

However, in an application, the poll panel said it had furnished to the Supreme Court a number of sealed envelopes, containing details on EBs encashed by the political parties, during the course of hearing in the matter.

It sought a direction for the return of those sealed envelopes to comply with the directions to upload it on the website as per order of March 11.

On Monday, the Supreme Court had told the SBI to furnish details of purchasers of Electoral Bonds and names of political parties redeemed those instruments by March 12 to the Election Commission, rejecting its plea for extension of time until June 30 for the purpose.

It had then directed the Election Commission to publish the information provided by the SBI on its website on March 15.

In its February 15, 2024 judgment, the SC had declared the Electoral Bonds scheme, introduced in 2018 for donation to political parties, as "unconstitutional" for being violative of the right to information.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.
News Network
March 17,2024

bonds.jpg

New Delhi: The Election Commission on Sunday made public fresh data on electoral bonds, which it had submitted in sealed covers to the Supreme Court and was later asked to put it in public domain.

These details are believed to be pertaining to the period before April 12, 2019. Electoral bond details after this date was made public by the poll panel last week.

The BJP encashed electoral bonds totalling Rs 6,986.5 crore; maximum Rs 2,555 crore received in 2019-20, as per the EC data.

The Trinamool Congress received Rs 1,397 crore through electoral bonds, second largest recipient after BJP, as per the EC data.

On the other hand, the Congress redeemed a total of Rs 1,334.35 crore through electoral bonds.

DMK received Rs 656.5 crore through electoral bonds, including Rs 509 crore from lottery king Santiago Martin's Future Gaming.

BJD encashed electoral bonds worth Rs 944.5 crore, YSR Congress Rs 442.8 crore, TDP Rs 181.35 crore.

Political parties had filed data on electoral bonds in sealed cover as directed by the Supreme Court's interim order dated April 12, 2019, the poll panel said in a statement.

"Data so received from political parties was deposited in the Supreme Court without opening sealed covers. In pursuance of the Supreme Court's order dated March 15, 2024, the Registry of the Supreme Court has returned physical copies along with a digitized record of the same in a pen drive in sealed cover. The Election Commission of India has today uploaded the data received in the digitized form from the registry of the Supreme Court on electoral bonds on its website," EC said.

Comments

Add new comment

  • Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
  • Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
  • Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
  • Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.