Today, Government of India implemented the bill of The Right to Education for Children. Undoubtedly, it is a welcome move in a country where more than 10 million children are deprived from proper education. Now, when we are growing consistently with 7% growth rate; the Government has ample money to fund the basic education of a child. After all it is the next generation, who will excel the country growth rate.
The one of the most important aspect of this Act is to include private schools in the process. In India, although 93% school going children go to public school, the rest 7% holds the advantage due to private school education. It is not that they are more brilliant than the other students; it is only because of the better monetary situation which they inherited from their parents. It is always a better idea to make the public schools at par with those; but till this happens, why should our future be deprived of quality education only due to their monetary condition?
All of this draw my attention towards one unaddressed issue - Regulation of Fees of Private Schools. In India, there is no regulation over the fees of primary education. It all depends on management how much they charge from parents. Many of the elite schools charge fees more than Engineering and Medical education. While admission, they ask for the bank statements of parents to check whether the parents have the capability to pay the fees or not. It is a standard symbol in our society to send children in Delhi Public School or other Convent School; not because they provide some extraordinary education, but only due to their high fees which can be bear only by elite class.
While Government is trying hard to provide basic education to child, many of programs are being run i.e. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, School Chalo Program, Midday Meal; we all are contributing towards those programs (through 2% and 3% Education Cess from our salary), it would be a better idea to regulate the fees of the Private Schools so that more and more children can get benefited by already existing good education system. Education is not a Privilege and the new act justifies this; it is high time for Government to come with a law for private school fees regulation.
With this a strict implementation of existing laws for public school betterment is very much required. My cook told me a shocking story that the Government School is illegally charging 500/- Rs. for his children in his village (Duttpur Village, Dist Jashpur, Orissa). Nobody is here to monitor this. Government has given clause of 220 days compulsory teaching for teachers but the question is who is going to measure that. In most of our rural schools, 'Master Ji' uses to fill the full month attendance at one day only. The lack of a strict performance measurement system for teachers is still haunting us and nation; especially in the case where government is pumping a big chunk of money to improve the education and literacy in our system. The advent of Unique Identity System for each citizen can solve the problem, through which an electronic monitoring will be possible for every teacher's working hour. Unique Identity is one of the most ambitious plan government has undertaken but the outcomes of it are still under carpet and we will have to wait for that.
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