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Resource centre on India's rural distress
 
 

RTE may not necessarily help tribal children: Study by Swati Shinde

Physical access to schooling and socio-cultural difference between children from scheduled tribes and children from the mainstream are factors responsible for tribal childrenbeing deprived of basic education, and the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory to Education (RTE) Act, 2009, will not necessarily help the tribal population of the country, reveals a recent study.


Astudy, carried out by S N Tripathi of the Gokhale Institute of Politicsand Economics (GIPE), has analysed that the present provisions in the RTE, which says that children of the tribal population will be provided schooling at a neighbouring village, will not help improve their literacy rate. The paper was presented at a national seminar on RTE and excluded people' recently in Pune organised by GIPE.


In his paper, Tripathi argues: "Experience as an empirical evidence shows that utilisation of school facilities is subject to distance. The nearer a person lives to this facility, the more likely it is that he orshe will use it assuming, of course, that there are no socio-economic barriers."


According to the RTE, tribal students can get themselves enrolled at a nearby village school. But, in the study, Tripathi said that, " Under the RTE, reaching those still out of reach does not mean merely expanding existing education system. It will mean designing and developing new models and delivery systems tailored to specific groups, in a concerted effort to ensure relevant high-quality basic education for every child and adult."


D Purandeswari, minister for state, Union ministry of Human Resource and Development, said that, "Under the RTE, we are trying to strengthen government-run schools and add more classrooms wherever necessary. We have also asked all states to do a mapping of schools in their state and submit a reporton the same. The mapping would be done using geo-spatial technology which will help us determine where there is concentration of schools andplaces where there is need of more schools."


Purendeswari admitted that, "At present there is a problem of accessibility, but, we are addressing the problem and the school mapping exercise will help us solve it."


She also informed that the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, a flagship scheme of the central government, which has a provision for oneschool in the radius of one kilometre for every 20 children, "but, thisnorm has been eased off in tribal areas and we are trying to provide more schools in the interiors. The intention is to improve accessibility."


Tripathi said: "Dysfunctional school system in tribal regions, coupled with the mindset of decision-makers tend to worsen the inequities. Some of the factors responsible for these inequities for tribal children are pervasive teacher absenteeism, psychological and social distance between the teacher and students, lackof concern on the part of teachers for children, and so on."


According to the study, in 2001, there were 14 million tribal children enrolled in elementary schools as against 20.24 million in the 6-14 age group. Thus, 6.24 million were still out of school in 2001. The drop outrates among tribal children was as high as 52.3 % for primary and 69.5 %for upper primary level.


Education expert Prasanna Hulikavi said, "On paper, fundamental right to education and all looks good. But,when it comes to implementation of these rights, it does not seem to work. If students still have to walk 4-5 km a day to reach their school,then no mother will send her child to school. The motivation among students is going to be limited. The RTE aims to spread education to all, but whether the tribal population is going to benefit from it, remains a big question."