The Right to Education, in effect since April 1, is set to cost the Centre a staggering 2,31,000 crore over the next five years according to fresh estimates. Previous estimates drawn up by National University of Education Planning & Administration (NUEPA) — the basis of financial planning for the RTE’s provisions so far — had pegged the requirement at Rs 1,71,000 crore. In a note submitted to the Expenditure Finance...

The PPP model proposed in the Eleventh Plan provides for no government or social control over education. It will lead to the privatisation and commercialisation of education using public funds.  Public-private partnership (PPP) has become a fashionable slogan in new development strategies, particularly over the last couple of decades. It is projected as an innovative idea to tap private resources and to encourage the active participation of the private sector...

Amid all the celebrations over the Right to Education (RTE) coming into effect from April 1, there is an elephant in the room that nobody is talking about. It's called dropout rate. The spotlight till now has been on expanding the infrastructure, appointing teachers, ensuring that schools are at walkable distances, and so on. All this is undoubtedly needed. But the biggest problem facing the schooling system is that over...

One looks forward to the Finance Minister's budget speech with a hope that it spells some new major initiatives and schemes for development, and that it might promise any major allocation of resources to any sector, besides fresh tax proposals. In the case of education sector, one might feel disappointed at the proposals made in the Union budget for 2010-11 on both counts. No new initiatives are proposed; no major...

India’s relative position with respect to the Education Development Index remains poor. There is a lot to do in terms of improving schooling facilities.  According to the ‘EFA Global Monitoring Report 2010’ (UNESCO), India’s rank was 105 among 128 countries. And it continues to figure, along with a bunch of African and one or two Asian countries, such as Pakistan and Bangladesh, in the group of countries with a low...