For long the education system in India has been promoting inequality, with excellent schools for the rich and bad schools for the poor. Even within government schools, there was a multi-tiered system with Kendriya Vidyalayas at the top end, and MCD schools at the bottom. This differentiation in the education system was the root cause of the increasing dropout rate in primary education itself, and the consequent rising illiteracy in the country.
It was on the backdrop of this scenario that the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, called the Right to Education (RTE) Act in short, was enacted by India’s Parliament in August 2009, and the same was notified on April I, 2010. It is therefore a Central Act – Education is in the concurrent list – thus applicable to all the States and Union Territories of the Country.
The RTE Act was enacted to ensure that all children of India between 6 to 14 years of age, regardless of their economic status, caste, class, creed or gender, would be given an elementary education by right and by law. In addition, the Act made some time-bound commitments, to ensure schools achieve certain minimum standards of quality, many of them culminating on April I, 2015. Besides, the Supreme Court has made it mandatory for the government, local authorities and private schools to reserve 25 per cent of their seats for the economically weaker sections, is one more step in making the right of education a reality for Indian children.
The RTE Act promises a neighbourhood school for each child, which provides quality education. This also implies making available good educational support and an environment in which children do not experience discrimination. In essence, the concept should mean that all children in a neighbourhood – no matter whether their fathers are industrialists, farmers or cleaners – should go to same school, and that all schools should have trained teachers, classrooms, toilets, books and other learning materials for all.
April I, 2015, marked five years since the notification of the historic RTE Act. The origin of this legislation is in the global conference held at Jomtien, Thailand, in 1990, where the following was put out World Declaration on Education for All; Meeting Basic Learning needs. The representatives of various countries across the globe had expressed, “we the participants in the World Conference on Education for All, reaffirm the right of all people to education. This is the foundation of our determination, singly and together to ensure education for all …. together we call on governments, concerned organizations and individuals to join in this urgent undertaking.”
Further, “The basic learning needs of all can and must be met … there has never been a more propitious time to commit ourselves to providing basic learning opportunities for all the people of the world. We adopt therefore this world declaration on education for all; meeting basic learning needs and agree on the framework for action to meet basic learning needs, to achieve the goals set forth in this declaration.”
Subsequently, another conference was held in April 2000, at Dakar, Senegal (West Africa), called the World Education Forum where a concrete framework for Education for All (EFA) was drawn up. The target date to meet the deadline for total literacy was 2015. Unfortunately, despite India’s best efforts it is unable to meet the deadline. According to a recent UNICEF report 20 per cent of children (between 6 to 14) in India are still out of school.
The financing of RTE remains a big issue. Union Finance Ministry put aside only Rs 42,219 crore in 2015-16 for school sector from Rs 55,115 crore in 2014-15 – flagship programmes like Sarva Shiksha Abiyan and Mid-Day meal, both looking at improving quality, are bound to suffer. The single largest area of spending tends to be on teacher salaries, followed by infrastructure. This doesn’t, however, ensure quality of teachers or proper infrastructure.
The RTE Act – which has seven Chapters and 38 Sections – in chapter 7, the section 29 and sub-section (2) mentions among other things that the evaluation procedure should be …… (h) comprehensive and continuous evaluation of the child’s understanding of knowledge and his/her ability to apply the same.
Though the RTE Act talks about not holding the child back in any of the classes from standard V to VII – which is interpreted as no-fail (nobody can be branded as a failure) policy – there are also duties and responsibilities of teachers outlined in the chapter IV, section 24 sub-section (I). It is mentioned that a teacher appointed ….. shall perform the following duties, among others (a) Maintain regularity and punctuality in attending school, (b) Conduct and complete the curriculum, (c) Complete entire curriculum within specified time. (d) Hold regular meetings with parents and guardians, etc. (e) Perform such other duties as may be prescribed.
The onus as per the RTE Act, is now more on the teacher to see that students learn. It is primarily meant to take pressure off students and change the way students were taught at school. Earlier, children in Indian schools have been trained to test their memory power rather than turn them into creative minds. In fact, changing the education system to have a no-fail policy, has put additional pressure on the teacher to teach the students the right way- the burden now has shifted to teachers from students.
Unfortunately, the Union Government recently said that schools across India are not getting the qualified teachers as 91 per cent of candidates aspiring to become teachers fail even in the basic test that they have to undergo. The RTE Act, enforced from April I, 2010, had set the deadline of March 31 this year to meet the teacher education and quality targets with the Central Teacher Eligibility Test (TET) mandated to ensure a national level benchmark for teaching quality, but very few are able to qualify. The minimum qualification fixed for teachers under the RTE Act has brought out the shocking phenomenon of 91 per cent candidates aspiring to teach in the elementary section of class VI to VIII flunking the basic teacher eligibility test (TET) conducted by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) this year.
The school managements are also duty-bound to maintain the proper Pupil Teacher ratio (PTR). The RTE Act mandates a 30:1 pupil teacher ratio – i.e. classes should have not more than 30 students, and that there should be one teacher for every 30 students, so as to give detailed attention to students as envisaged in the plan to have no-fail policy. Monitoring of each student has become a most important task of a teacher and needs complete focus. However, official data shows that about 60 per cent of all schools in the country fail to meet this
critical criterion – 30:I pupil teacher ratio. Many states don’t have grievance redressal mechanisms, and even where they exist, the rate of disposal of complaints has been abysmal.
Although RTE still has some significant gaps, for instance neglecting the age group 3-6» it nevertheless has many strong points. If implemented in its true spirit of ensuring a neighborhood school of an acceptable standards of quality, it would go a long way in ensuring that all children get equal opportunity in education. Indeed, all of India’s children need to have an equal opportunity to quality education. The RTE Act has infused a new hope into them. Let us not fail them.
(The writer is a freelance journalist)
