4th August 2009 marked a breathtaking leap of Republic of India into the realms of a new and a promising world assuring its future generations a bright future. The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act entitles every child in the age group of 6-14 irrespective of his/her means and background, an equal opportunity to access to elementary education. This Act sees the dream coming true, not only of the members of Constituent Assembly but also of all the forerunners of Indian Freedom Movement who wished to see India as a strong and prosperous nation and a development gateway.
Some of the salient features of this historical act include the responsibility of the state to bear all expenses that might be incurred in the implementation of the Act. Also the Act directs that no school shall deny admission to any child in the age group laid down for any reason, and even the children from weaker and poorer sections of society shall be imparted equal education in the vicinity of their elite counterparts. Also the Act lays down provisions to improve quality of school education in India and also increase the teacher to student ratio. This is an ambitious idea indeed and requires an impartial and honest effort by every citizen of India. But undoubtedly, the legislation paves a way for a better tomorrow before India.
RTE comes with numerous hopes to curb social evils like child labour and even abortions by parents unable to afford the bringing up of the child. An uneducated underclass is a source of chaos and threat to the middle class notion of order. However now we can hope a faster recovery from this practical incumbency of underprivileged remaining the losers. This is an excellent platform for reaching the unreached. The target bunch of this act is surely not the elite class but the dwellers of poor villages, slums and wards of labour class, who can be often seen polishing shoes, washing car screens, picking up empty bottles from municipality garbage bins or brining you tea in cheap restaurants in mighty cities of India. Their shabby appearance and untended ways can be repulsive, but they have very well proved their strong will to excel, by setting exemplars of succeeding in nation’s toughest competitive examinations of IAS, IITs and MBBS colleges. The infamous institution- Super Thirty in Patna is a self evident example of the fact, that given a single chance, these underdogs are in no way lagging behind.
But framing the Law is just not enough. The big question mark that lies ahead is how to bring this myth to a reality? And the bitter fact about reality is that the children one finds lurking around on roads and crossings, selling magazines, pirated books, showing around juggleries or circus stunts, or maybe even begging are not there out of choice, but out of needs. They need money to buy food, for themselves or for their families more desperately than education. If one ever spares a minute to ask them if they would like to study, one would find a blunt answer, “No, What would they get from education”. These children hardly find any motivation to miss their daily earnings of few bucks to go to study, which hardly would have any fruitful prospects to them in coming years. Even parents are not ready to send their children to schools because of same reason.
The second potential threat to RTE is the pathology of infrastructure in India. With 40 million new candidates to schooling under RTE, our schools don’t appear prepared at all for the implementation. It seems that the Act needs a gestation period of much more than three months that have elapsed since its commencement. Though government has directed private schools to have 25% quota for admissions under RTE, this just doesn’t seem to be working out. There is an utter need for finer details and more workable guidelines to be laid down for properly channelizing efforts towards implementation of the act. The government aided school which can prove instrumental in growth of suburban elementary education are not adequately equipped with infrastructure and faculty. The Act indiscriminately forces itself upon the private schools to admit every child has certainly brought the furore from the latter. The elite schools are unwilling to dilute their ‘culture’ by taking in children from the weaker sections of society in the same class rooms as their other high class students whom they look upon as the leaders of tomorrow who would bring laurels to their scoreboards. Moreover this poses a financial overburden on schools who charge tens of thousands of rupees as annual fees. Other random reasons also always become cases of intense concern. The recent denial of admission by a Mumbai school to a girl witness of Mumbai terror attack needs a lot of deliberation on the stakes of both the school and the girl child. India being already being in a phase of rapid economic development in every phase, really needs to keep the infrastructure development with high priority to fully enact RTE.
It has been a common notion and experience, that various relief packages, funds, and development budgets passed by government are hardly seen actually reaching the hands of needy. RTE might not seem very analogical here to the colossal and high profile construction contracts, or welfare schemes but certainly is very prone to fall to corrupt ends, since as described earlier, the targeted receivers under this act shall be the poor, who have no power and have been suppressed since ever. So it is very important for the government to be an alert watchdog in the implementation of various schemes of infrastructure development, faculty recruitment and distribution of funds till the grass root level. It’s important to impart a decent education or no education otherwise.
It is said that the real foundation of a student is laid at an early age. The RTE act emphasises on elementary education for the children of age 6-14. But it doesn’t aim at the pre-elementary foundation of students below age of 6 which is very important for settling the socially weak but mentally brilliant children in the mainstream. Though this expansion can be thought of at some later stages, but this is absolutely important to turn the basic idea behind RTE a reality.
In spite of all the facts above, we cannot give up here. Just because the present form of RTE is not a very close to its goals doesn’t mean that we give up on millions of children. The initiatives and endeavour taken by the centre in hand is undoubtedly praiseworthy. And we all can contribute in it by helping children around us to have access to education. Quoting from a newspaper; “Even if a fraction of poor children is able to get into schools which offer quality education, just imagine the social revolution that will gradually unfold.” This is a dream which has already transformed into an idea. An idea whose time has to come, and soon it will be transformed into actions and results and reality.
Some of the salient features of this historical act include the responsibility of the state to bear all expenses that might be incurred in the implementation of the Act. Also the Act directs that no school shall deny admission to any child in the age group laid down for any reason, and even the children from weaker and poorer sections of society shall be imparted equal education in the vicinity of their elite counterparts. Also the Act lays down provisions to improve quality of school education in India and also increase the teacher to student ratio. This is an ambitious idea indeed and requires an impartial and honest effort by every citizen of India. But undoubtedly, the legislation paves a way for a better tomorrow before India.
RTE comes with numerous hopes to curb social evils like child labour and even abortions by parents unable to afford the bringing up of the child. An uneducated underclass is a source of chaos and threat to the middle class notion of order. However now we can hope a faster recovery from this practical incumbency of underprivileged remaining the losers. This is an excellent platform for reaching the unreached. The target bunch of this act is surely not the elite class but the dwellers of poor villages, slums and wards of labour class, who can be often seen polishing shoes, washing car screens, picking up empty bottles from municipality garbage bins or brining you tea in cheap restaurants in mighty cities of India. Their shabby appearance and untended ways can be repulsive, but they have very well proved their strong will to excel, by setting exemplars of succeeding in nation’s toughest competitive examinations of IAS, IITs and MBBS colleges. The infamous institution- Super Thirty in Patna is a self evident example of the fact, that given a single chance, these underdogs are in no way lagging behind.
But framing the Law is just not enough. The big question mark that lies ahead is how to bring this myth to a reality? And the bitter fact about reality is that the children one finds lurking around on roads and crossings, selling magazines, pirated books, showing around juggleries or circus stunts, or maybe even begging are not there out of choice, but out of needs. They need money to buy food, for themselves or for their families more desperately than education. If one ever spares a minute to ask them if they would like to study, one would find a blunt answer, “No, What would they get from education”. These children hardly find any motivation to miss their daily earnings of few bucks to go to study, which hardly would have any fruitful prospects to them in coming years. Even parents are not ready to send their children to schools because of same reason.
The second potential threat to RTE is the pathology of infrastructure in India. With 40 million new candidates to schooling under RTE, our schools don’t appear prepared at all for the implementation. It seems that the Act needs a gestation period of much more than three months that have elapsed since its commencement. Though government has directed private schools to have 25% quota for admissions under RTE, this just doesn’t seem to be working out. There is an utter need for finer details and more workable guidelines to be laid down for properly channelizing efforts towards implementation of the act. The government aided school which can prove instrumental in growth of suburban elementary education are not adequately equipped with infrastructure and faculty. The Act indiscriminately forces itself upon the private schools to admit every child has certainly brought the furore from the latter. The elite schools are unwilling to dilute their ‘culture’ by taking in children from the weaker sections of society in the same class rooms as their other high class students whom they look upon as the leaders of tomorrow who would bring laurels to their scoreboards. Moreover this poses a financial overburden on schools who charge tens of thousands of rupees as annual fees. Other random reasons also always become cases of intense concern. The recent denial of admission by a Mumbai school to a girl witness of Mumbai terror attack needs a lot of deliberation on the stakes of both the school and the girl child. India being already being in a phase of rapid economic development in every phase, really needs to keep the infrastructure development with high priority to fully enact RTE.
It has been a common notion and experience, that various relief packages, funds, and development budgets passed by government are hardly seen actually reaching the hands of needy. RTE might not seem very analogical here to the colossal and high profile construction contracts, or welfare schemes but certainly is very prone to fall to corrupt ends, since as described earlier, the targeted receivers under this act shall be the poor, who have no power and have been suppressed since ever. So it is very important for the government to be an alert watchdog in the implementation of various schemes of infrastructure development, faculty recruitment and distribution of funds till the grass root level. It’s important to impart a decent education or no education otherwise.
It is said that the real foundation of a student is laid at an early age. The RTE act emphasises on elementary education for the children of age 6-14. But it doesn’t aim at the pre-elementary foundation of students below age of 6 which is very important for settling the socially weak but mentally brilliant children in the mainstream. Though this expansion can be thought of at some later stages, but this is absolutely important to turn the basic idea behind RTE a reality.
In spite of all the facts above, we cannot give up here. Just because the present form of RTE is not a very close to its goals doesn’t mean that we give up on millions of children. The initiatives and endeavour taken by the centre in hand is undoubtedly praiseworthy. And we all can contribute in it by helping children around us to have access to education. Quoting from a newspaper; “Even if a fraction of poor children is able to get into schools which offer quality education, just imagine the social revolution that will gradually unfold.” This is a dream which has already transformed into an idea. An idea whose time has to come, and soon it will be transformed into actions and results and reality.
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