By IANS
New Delhi : The central government is targeting 80 percent literacy by 2012, against the present 65.38 percent, with a whopping Rs.850 billion ($21 billion) earmarked for education during the 11th Five Year Plan.
“We have already committed for complete literacy by 2015,” said A.K. Rath, the secretary, secondary education and literacy, in the human resources development ministry.
Officials said the money earmarked towards education during the 11th plan was five times the budgeted allocation from the previous five-year plan budget. The bulk of it is for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, the ministry’s flagship programme.
The ministry said it was committed to promoting elementary education across the country and there was no need for any external support. However, the government is open to public-private-partnership in secondary schools, officials said.
“If private concerns are interested to contribute their share in building the infrastructure for secondary school education, we can definitely move ahead with this plan,” said Rath.
He claimed that the dropout rates had also come down and that the government was committed to enhancing the reach of the SSA.
“We are short of teachers for the programme. We are stressing on quality, equity in the ongoing 11th plan. We are looking at improving basic learning for students, computers, infrastructure in schools and improve teaching standards.
In regards to the recommendations of the National Knowledge Commission set up by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh under technocrat Sam Pitroda, the ministry did not appear convinced, and officials said, it had left many officials baffled.
Pitroda’s Knowledge Commission had suggested an independent regulator for the education sector and had pointed fingers at the functioning of the University Grants Commission, the HRD Ministry and some technical institutions.
It had, accordingly, suggested reforms and drastic cut in their jurisdiction, even as it wanted radical changes in system of higher and vocational education.
Sukhdeo Thorat, chairman of the University Grants Commission, which oversees the functioning and grant of funds to universities across the country, said it was not possible to have a uniform calendar for universities in the country.
“There will be some delay in the sessions of universities,” said Thorat, when asked to respond on growing discontent among students who sometimes lose an entire year while getting admitted to higher courses in other universities.