Govt in Rs 35,000 cr education push

The Union human resource development ministry is likely to launch an ambitious Rs 35,000 crore secondary education project in the next academic session. It will be on the lines of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan programme for primary education.

Named the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA), the project aims at providing universal access to secondary education to all students in the 15-16 age group (classes IX and X) during the Eleventh Plan period. Its total budget till the year 2020 is a huge Rs 90,485 crore.

Under RMSA, access to a high school (classes IX and X) is to be provided within a distance of 5 km. It would also address equity issues and reduce various disparities like rural-urban, gender, socio-economic (SC/ST/OBC/minority/weaker sections), sources said.

Though focused on secondary education, the programme also envisages a higher secondary school within 7 km of any habitation.

The strategy of the programme, which aims at universal retention by 2020, includes upgrade of upper primary schools through construction of additional classrooms, laboratories, library and computer rooms.

In addition, separate toilets for girls and boys, and appointment of additional teachers would also be part of the programme. RMSA also has provisions to strengthen existing secondary schools by providing same facilities, officials said.

In-service training of teachers, leadership training, computer-aided education apart from curricular reforms would be included in the programme, which would improve the quality of secondary education in the country, they said.

"The secondary education sector did not get adequate focus during the Tenth Plan and the activities were restricted to the efforts made by the state governments. Though the constitutional mandate is to provide elementary education only, the ministry felt it is essential to move towards universalisation of secondary education, which has been achieved in a large number of developed countries by now. Now, in the Eleventh Plan period, the emphasis would be on the secondary education sector through the RMSA," an official said.

Mentioning the launch of such programme in his Independence Day speech, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said, "We are setting out a goal of universalising secondary education, which is clearly the next step after universalising elementary education. Much work has to be done before we are in a position to launch the Scheme for Universalisation of Access for Secondary Education (SUCCESS). Its details need to be quickly spelt out and discussed with states so that we can launch the programme in 2008-09."

Now, with the strategies in place, the ministry is working to launch RMSA from the next academic session.

As per the 2001 census, the population in the 14-18 age group (secondary and higher secondary education level) was 8.55 crore and estimated to increase to 9.69 crore by March 2007 (beginning of the Eleventh Plan).

According to the HRD ministry, in 2004-05, the gross enrolment ratio for classes IX and X was 51.65 per cent whereas that for classes XI and XII was just 27.82 per cent.