From rxpgnews.com

India Education
Rajasthan opposes change in funding for education scheme
Apr 11, 2007 - 9:34:05 PM

Jaipur, April 11 - Rajasthan has requested the central government to continue to bear 75 percent of funding for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan -, a central government scheme that helps provide elementary education to all children.

Rajasthan Education Minister Ghanshyam Tiwari told IANS over telephone from New Delhi Wednesday that Rajasthan is against changes in funding pattern of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan - scheme.

'I have put this view in the two-day conference of education ministers at Vigyan Bhawan in New Delhi on Tuesday,' Tiwari said.

He cautioned that if the funding pattern of SSA was changed the scheme would suffer and state governments might not be able to bear the financial burden.

'If the funding ratio of SSA is reverted to 50:50 from 75:25 between the centre and states, the progress of SSA would be adversely affected,' Tiwari said.

He also demanded that secondary education be brought under the scheme and provide assistance to states accordingly. He said that universalisation of secondary education is the need of the hour.

The minister said it is also essential to promote middle schools into secondary schools.

To boost infrastructure facilities assistance from the central government is required, he said.

Tiwari expressed the necessity of launching teachers' training programmes for maintaining qualitative education. In spite of complex geographic surroundings, Rajasthan has been honoured with the UNESCO Award in the field of literacy and continuous education.

The minister said the number of registered students has increased from 8.84 million in 2001 to 12.4 million in 2006. Likewise, the gap in gender ratio has been reduced to 10.13 percent in 2006 in comparison to 16.97 percent of 2001. The dropout rate of 66.15 percent in 2001 has come down to 34.17 percent in 2006.



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