ummid.com: New Delhi: Monday, April 01, 2013.
Three years
since it came into being and promised free and compulsory education to all
children in the 6-14 age group in India, redressing violations of the Right to
Education (RTE) Act across the country has been apparently poor, a fact
ascribed by the chief monitoring body to teacher shortage and lack of
educational infrastructure.
An RTI reply
reveals that till date only 32 percent cases of violation have been dealt with.
According to the RTI reply, of the 3,632 complaints received over the last
three years, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR),
the chief monitoring body for the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory
Education Act, has been able to act on just 1,191 cases. In other words, 68
percent of the cases remain unacted.
RTI activist
Rashmi Gupta, who had sought the information, said that the figures are
disheartening, to say the least.
A different
RTI querry filed by Gupta further revealed that the Delhi Commission for
Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR) has received 557 complaints of RTE
violations in the last three years, of which 116 have been disposed of - a
disposal rate of 21 percent.
"Under
sections 27 and 28 of the RTE Act, these commissions (state commissions and the
NCPCR) are to monitor and redress violations of the Act. The RTI data shows the
lack of efficacy on the part of the commissions in redressing grievances. So
where do parents and guardians go if a child's right to education is
violated?" Gupta asked.
"Hence
it is important that the accountability (of the commissions) is fixed,"
she added.
To give some
state-wise examples: NCPCR received 970 complaints from Delhi over the last
three years. Only 235 have been disposed of until now. Similarly, of the 842
complaints received from Andhra Pradesh, only 44 have been disposed of.
In the case
of Uttar Pradesh, 83 of the 179 complaints have been disposed of and in the
case of Maharashtra, 108 of 150 have been disposed of.
Elaborating
on the nature of complaints received, the RTI reply states:
"Infrastructure, corporal punishment, denial of admission, denial of
entitlements, pupil-teacher ratio, and detention are the major issues regarding
which complaints were made."
Surprisingly,
NCPCR chairperson Shantha Sinha has a different take on the figures revealed by
the RTI reply. "Every complaint that has come to us has been disposed of.
We don't have any case pending," Sinha told IANS.
When
questioned about the discrepancy in her statement and what her department
revealed in the RTI reply, Sinha said: "There has been a misunderstanding.
What the RTI reply meant by disposal was closing down of a case. It's true that
a little over 30 percent of the complaints, or cases have been closed down, and
that is because we don't close a case until we are satisfied with the action
taken."
Sinha said
that the biggest challenge has been addressing the shortage of qualified
teachers.
"Shortage
of trained teachers remains a problem. Recruitment of teachers is still in
process...there are still para-teachers and Shiksha Mitras. Infrastructure is
also a challenge, like toilets and clean drinking water in all schools. Things
are not becoming worse, but progress is very slow," she admitted.
On the
positives, the chairperson said that since the Act's implementation, awareness
among parents about their child's education has increased, and so has the
enrolment rate in schools. However, the recently released Annual Status of
Education Report (ASER) raised questions about the quality of education.
"You
can't look at quality of education in isolation, because to ensure quality,
other factors have to be considered, like good teachers. A lot of work is still
to be done, and the field of education needs more investment," Sinha said.
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