Wednesday, September 12, 2012

RIGHT TO EDUCATION - AN APPRAISAL

Universalisation of Elementary Education

A National Goal

Universalisation of Elementary Education (UEE) has been accepted as a national goal in India since independence. The Indian constitution recognized UEE as a crucial input for nation building and included it in the Directive Principles to be implemented with in a period of ten years. Article 45 of the constitution states, “The State shall endeavour to provide with 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”

The National Education Policies have retired the constitutional directive. Te National Policy on Education, 1986, provided that “Free and compulsory education of satisfactory quality shall be provided to all children up to the age of 14 years before we enter the 21st century.” The Programme of Action (POA), 1992 outlined various strategies for achieving this goal.

Millennium Development Goals

In the millennium year (2000) leaders of 189 nation states including India, signed the United Nations sponsored Millennium Declaration, which set out the Millennium Development Goals (MDGS) to inter alia ensure that all children around the world are in primary school by the year 2015. In adherence with this declaration, the Central Government announced its Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, 2001 (Education for All) programme and tabled the 86th Constitutional Amendment Act, 2002 which was passed with unanimous acclamation by Parliament.

With the Right to Education Act coming into force, India has joined the league of over 130 countries which have legal guarantees to provide free and compulsory education to children. According to the UNESCO’s ‘Education for All Global Monitoring Report 2010’, about 135 countries have constitutional providing free and compulsory schooling to children in the 6-14 year age bracket, came into force with effect from the 1st April, 2010 . With the new education act now, India has joined some 20 other countries including Afghanistan, China and Switzerland, which have laws guaranteeing free and compulsory education for eight years of elementary education.

Constitutional Safe Guards:

The 86th Amendment (December, 2002) of the Constitution includes the following changes.

Article 21A: Right to Education:

“The State shall provide free and compulsory education to all children of the age of 6-14 years, in such a manner as the State may, by law determine”.

Article 45: Provision for Early Childhood Care and Education to Children below the Age of 6 years:

“The State shall endeavor to provide early childhood care and education for all children until they complete the age of six years”.

Article 51A: Clause ‘k’ has been added in 51A Fundamental Duties:

It shall be the duty of every citizen of India “who is a parent or guardian to provide opportunities for education to his child or, as the case may be ward between the age f and 14 years”.


International Recognition of Education as a Human Right:

The right to education is marked priority on the agenda of the international community since it is quintessential for the exercise of all other human rights. A number of human rights treaties accepted and recognized internationally, identifies right to education as a fundamental aspect for development and social transformation

The right to education is clearly acknowledged in the United Nations’ Universal
Declaration of Human Right (UDHR)
, adopted in 1948, which States:

“Everyone has the right to education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit…..”(Article 26).

The Right to Education Act, 2009: An Overview

Article 21-A and the RTE Ac came into effect on 1 April 2010. The title of the RTE Act incorporates the words ‘free and compulsory’. ‘free education ‘ means that no child , other than a child who has been admitted by his or her parents to school which is not supported by the appropriate Government, shall be liable to pay any kind of fee or charges or expenses which may prevent him or her from pursuing and completing elementary education. ‘Compulsory education’ casts on obligation on the appropriate Government and local authorities to provide and ensure admission, attendance and completion of elementary education by all children in the 6-14age group. The Key provision of the act overviewed as follows:

Duties of Appropriate Government and local Authority:

•All children between the ages of 6-14 have access to a neighborhood school with the prescribe number of teachers having prescribed minimum qualifications, building ad infrastructure as defined in the Act.
•All children are entitled to free and compulsory admission , attendance and completion of elementary education (Class 1 to VIII)
•No child shall be denied any of the entitlement guaranteed under the Act on the ground of community, caste or religion, gender , rural, urban , rich or poor , able or with special needs – they will study together in an inclusive environment.
•Good quality elementary education conforming to the standards as prescribes in the Act.
•Provision of training facilities and professional development for teachers.
•Monitoring of school functioning.
•Children will study in their age appropriate class and special training will be provided for out of school children who are being enrolled and need to catch up.

Duties and responsibilities of schools:

•School shall create an environment free of fear, anxiety and stress – there will be no detention, no corporal punishment, no mental harassment and no expulsion. Teachers will care for children and respect their dignity.
•School cannot deny admission to any children the grounds of lack of birth / transfer certificate and they shall be admitted in their age appropriate class.
•School shall admit out of school children through out the academic year.
•A School must have clean class rooms, safe drinking water, toilets (Separate for girls / boys), play area and library facilities.
•Children will have a school Management Committee comprising elected representative who will monitor the progress of the school and draw up a school development plan.
•Prescribe minimum working days and hours for teachers.
•Private / unaided schools will reserve 25% seats for children from disadvantaged communities as stated in the Act.

Duties and Responsibilities of Teachers:

•Maintain regularity and punctuality in attending school.
•Conduct and complete the curriculum in accordance with the provisions of section 29 of RTE Act 2009 within the specified time.
•Maintain a file containing the cumulative records for every child will be the basic for awarding the completion certificate when the child finishes class VIII
•Hold regular meeting with parents and guardians and appraise them regularly about attendance of their children, the child’s learning ability, progress and any another relevant information.
•Participate in training programmes.
•No teacher shall engage himself or herself in private tuition or in private activity.

Suggestions:

Budgetary allocation for RTE-SSA Programme should be adequate to meet the centre’s commitment of 65% since most state government is struggling with ballooning budget deficits. Due to paucity of funds with the Government for allotment under the Act, substantial public-private participation in elementary education may be considered for its effective implementation. The most important challenge, if the ground reality is taken into account is the abject poverty coupled with population explosion emerges as the root causes of depriving the children their right to education. If our Government is really serious abut effective implementation of RTE, and then poverty has to be accepted as a biggest challenge. In addition to that, the spectrum of implementation issues covering finance, accountability and monitoring need to be addressed forthwith.


Source: KURUKSHETRA






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