Budget 2018: Top 5 Allotments for the Education Sector

Union Budget is definitely the biggest hope of the nation and so it is expected to create opportunities in education sector, skilled as well as non skilled training, raising the employment rate etc. As it should be set within the economic caliber of a country, the luxury in allotment may not be convincing always. However, what we should hope for is a genuine and realistic budget exclusively meant for the betterment of our country.

Anyhow let us measure the focus of budget towards education sector:

According to the expert view the budget 2018, for the education sector is a welcoming one. This can hopefully work for the development of the educational infrastructure, supporting the digital education, better space for researching etc.

• It is true that for bringing change in the education sector the beginning should be set at the under privileged group. One such move is to set up Ekalavya Model Residential Schools and this will maintain a standard that is equivalent to that of the Navodaya Vidyalayas. This is meant for tribal children and aims at providing quality education for them in their own environment. Following, by the year 2022, in an area with more than 50% ST population, 20,000 will be allotted with extra facilities that can preserve the local art and culture. Together will all these support, sessions will be there for skill development and sports training.
• In this budget special steps are taken for promoting the research works and the related infrastructure. “Revitalizing Infrastructure and Systems in Education” (RISE) is a concept with investment for researches based on the education as well as health institutions. The investment of Rs. 100,000 crore is set for this project and will be launched by 2022. We know research is the base line for the development in all sector and so the right step for change must be started there. Apart from resources or any other conveniences, proper planning is mandatory for such developments.
• The quality of teaching is another important thing in the education sector. If we analyze today’s educational set up only 50% are fulfilled with such resources and definitely the rest is struggling with lack of good teachers or guiding resources. Probably, the under privileged are those group who are affected the most and so definitely consciously planned structure is in demand for tremendous change. Therefore with such an aim for fostering the teaching section, an integrated B.Ed. programme, Prime Minister’s Research Fellows (PMRF) exclusively meant for teachers has been launched this year. This is definitely intended for improving the quality in teaching. Under this programme, thousand B.Tech students with best academic history will be shortlisted every year and will be given facilities to do research in IIT or IISc. The fellowship amount for the selected students will be Rs. 80,000 per month.
• Another new composite scheme has been introduced for the education sector and this is meant for nursery to class 12. Already there are many school schemes that are provided for the students in different age groups. The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan or SSA is one such scheme that is has been catered for the students in class 1 to class 8. The other scheme, called Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan or RMSA is meant for the students in class 9 and class 10. Anyhow no special scheme is given for class 11 and class 12. But this new composite scheme has some features extended to pre-primary as well as senior secondary education sector. This is considered as a merger of SSA and RMSA, along with that some additional features too are given. All state government has been intimated about this scheme and is clearly a part of it.
• In this year’s budget, it has been notified that no Centrally Funded Institutions (CFIs) will receive budget grants for their infrastructure development. The institutions included here are IITs, IIMs, NITs and some central Universities. Anyhow, there funding will be moved to the Higher Education Funding Agency (HEFA).

Though budget is scattered to a lot of other sector, the expectation in the education sector is always a bit high. It is true that in long term, a full-fledged planning on the education sector can serve as the back bone of a nation’s development.