Often parents are heard saying ‘Aajkal Bachchon Ki Padhayee Ke Kharche Bahut Badh Gaye Hain, Why ?

Why not have Indian School Education Services / State Education Services like we have Indian Forest Service ?

DAYA SAGAR

Allahabad ( now Prayagraj ) bench of UP High Court had on August 18, 2015 ( Judgement Court 34 of Justice Sudhir Agarwal, J ) had among other things also directed the Chief Secretary UP Government to take appropriate action in the matter in consultation with other Officials, responsible in this regard to ensure that the children/wards of Government servants, semi-Government servants, local bodies, representatives of people, judiciary and all such persons who receive any perk, benefit or salary etc. from State exchequer or public fund, send their child/children/wards who are in age of receiving primary education, to Primary Schools run by Board. Surely that was due to poor delivery of services by government schools. It was reported by PTI in Oct 2018 that a plea was also filed by advocate Shiv Kumar Tripathi before Apex Court challenging the Allahabad High Court’s order refusing to initiate contempt proceedings against the state government for not complying with the earlier judgment that had directed that kids of government servants, local bodies’ representatives, judicial officers, who receive perks and salary from the state exchequer, should study in schools run by the Uttar Pradesh Board the present status of that could not be retrieved at the time of writing this story. Anyhow surely the order of 2015 has not been implemented in letter and spirit till date.
So often parents these days are found opining that they are very much hard pressed with the expenditure on education( even school education) of their children. Those who had educated their children in 1960s or 1950s may ask why pleading like that since in their times they never felt burden of atleast the school education of their children.
True these days the expenditure on the education of the children/wards has increased firstly since desire for better education has percolated deep in almost all the social and economic segments of community , secondly youth & parents have become more ambitious and education is surely the best available ladder that could possibly be used for lifting the socio-economic status of an individual and thirdly because there has been increase in number of aspirants for higher education / job status many times in comparison to what it was in 60s & 70s & so has increased the need for high academic scores even at secondary school level/ college level.
The expenditure that the parents are required to make on the basic school/ secondary school education, coaching for entrance examinations, professional education, higher education and competitive exams could be briefly categorized atleast in four segments (i) upto secondary School (ii) Preparation for entrance examination of graduate level professional / general education (iii) professional / university education (iv) coaching for competitive tests/ examinations.
The question that has been taken up here for addressing first is difficulties being expressed by a very large segment of parents for the education of their children even while they are in secondary school level and that too by even those also who live in cities / towns like Jammu , Srinagar, Ludhiana, Delhi etc in a democratic/ socialist country like India. In India both the Union as well as the State / UT Governments spend fortunes out of the state revenue ( which includes the tax paid on a match box even by a beggar) on school education where a very large amount of the expenditure is made on the salaries / allowances paid to the teaching and supervisory staff. Whereas even in cities like Jammu ( what to talk of remote villages)even the senior teachers / Senior Officers of Education Department may be minutely found sending their own children in the government schools where they themselves teach or the schools they themselves super wise / administer. And of course the general public too follows the stream thinking that may be the level of teaching in government schools in not good. Hence parents are made by the circumstances to spend high amounts of money in private schools even on school education of their children which they would have otherwise got almost free of cost.
It is not out of place to mention here that most of the government schools up to secondary level ( that too in cities ) could be found equipped with teachers with much better qualifications as compared to private school / academies , the teachers in government schools have better job security / prospects and the salaries paid ( pay scales and allowances) to government school teachers are in general much superior in comparison to salaries paid to most of the primary / secondary school teachers in private schools. Not only that it is also found that most of the parents who send their children to costly private school / academy also simultaneously spend additional money on arranging private tuition for their children ( before or after school hours) on regular basis. Ofcourse some students may need additional support and that may be provided to them but these days it has become a forcing need for almost all parents ( whether they can afford it or not ). Had the government school education infrastructure been delivering in proportion to the inputs from state exchequer many parents would have been relieved of atleast Rs.1000 to 5000 / per child unnecessary financial burden but that is not happening . Hence so often parents are heard saying “Aajkal bachchon ki padayee k ekharche bahut bad geye Hain”. Position of government schools / school education administration was much much better in 1960s/1970s.

To be continued
(The author is Sr Journalist, social activist and analyst J&K affairs [email protected]).