Education boost: checking drop-outs, new scholarships

Waking up to the reality that drop-out rates are the highest between Class VI and IX, the government has moved in with scholarships, meals and funds to plug the gaping hole in the education-for-all programme.

Waking up to the reality that drop-out rates are the highest between Class VI and IX, the government has moved in with scholarships, meals and funds to plug the gaping hole in the education-for-all programme.

First, the meals. The mid-day meal programme — which serves cooked meals to about 12 crore children upto Class V in government schools — will now be served to children upto Class VIII in 3,427 educationally-backward blocks (where female rural literacy is below national average and gender gap in literacy is above national average). And the mid-day meal scheme will be provided Rs 7,324 crore next year.

Second, the scholarships. The government followed the lead given by the Veerappa Moily Oversight Committee which had proposed a national merit scholarship scheme to one lakh meritorious students from marginalized groups of SCs, STs, OBCs, between Class IX and XII.

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Finance Minister P Chidambaram was, however, all-inclusive as he went ahead with the proposal. Admitting that the “critical year appears to be the transition between Class VIII and IX”, he announced the “national merit-cum-means scholarship programme” where students from all sections will be selected on the basis of a national test conducted for those who have cleared Class VIII. Every student will get Rs 6,000 per year for four years, till he or she clears Class XII.

Funding, he said, will be through a Rs 750 crore corpus for the first year and a like amount will be added for the next three years, which will be deposited in the State Bank of India, and the yield from this will fund the scholarship scheme.

The FM did not forget the marginalized. Funds for the post-matric scholarship programme for SC and ST students has been increased from Rs 440 crore in 2006-07 to Rs 611 crore in 2007-08. A separate provision of Rs 91 crore for similar scholarships to students belonging to socially and educationally backward classes has also been proposed.

And for minority students, Rs 72 crore has been kept for pre-matric scholarships and Rs 90 crore for post-matric scholarships. And thirdly, the funding for the secondary education — between Class IX and XII — have also been doubled, from Rs 1,837 crore in 2006-07 to Rs 3,794 crore in 2007-08.

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The government has also increased the allocation for school education by about 35 per cent. In 2007-08, an amount of Rs 23,142 crore has been allocated as against Rs 17,133 crore in 2006-07.

Of this outlay, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) will be provided Rs 10,671 crore — down from last year’s Rs 11,000 crore — as the funding for this programme moves from the 75:25 share between the Centre and states to 50:50. This means, that while overall funding for SSA has been increased from about Rs 13,000 crore to about Rs 21,000 crore, the Centre’s share reduces.

To improve the quality of teaching — the next big issue after curbing the drop-out rate — funding has been tripled: provision for strengthening teachers training institutions has been increased from Rs 162 crore to Rs 450 crore. In addition, 2 lakh more teachers will be appointed next year (up from over 1 lakh this year) and 5 lakh new classrooms will be constructed.

Besides, the transfer to Prarambhik Shiksha Kosh — funds collected through education cess — will be increased from Rs 8,746 crore to Rs 10,393 crore.

For parents: student loan incentives

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With effect from April 1, 2008, not just students, their parents or spouses will be entitled to tax deduction (from the gross income) equal to interest paid each year on loan for higher education. Earlier, only students got benefit for 8 years on loan taken. The benefit was earlier not allowed to parents but to students when they would start repaying.