E-Paper
₹1,126-crore boost for Punjab under Samagra Shiksha plan
The Centre has given nod to funds that will boost school education and teacher training in Punjab under the Samagra Shiksha programme, a centrally sponsored integrated scheme.
The Union ministry of education has approved a budget of ₹1,126 crore for school education and teacher training in Punjab for financial year 2021-22 under the Samagra Shiksha programme.
The budget, which includes funds recurring and non-recurring expenditure, is 25% higher than the tentative fund allocation of ₹906 crore indicated to the state government by the central ministry in April this year under the flagship centrally sponsored integrated scheme for school education.
Of this, ₹735.73 crore, or say 65% funds, have been approved for elementary education (classes 1 to 8) and ₹368 crore, which constitute 32%, for secondary education (classes 9 to 12). The remaining ₹22 crore have been earmarked for teacher education, including State Council for Educational Research and Training and Districts Institutes of Education and Training, in the state, according to the sanction letter sent by the Union ministry of education (MoE) to the Punjab government last week.
The state’s annual work plan and budget for 2021-22 was approved after a meeting of the project approval board headed by Union secretary, school education and languages, Anita Karwal was held on July 1 through video conference to discuss its proposals. School education secretary, Punjab, Krishan Kumar, joint secretary, MoE, Maneesh Garg and additional state project director, Punjab, Manoj Pushkarna were participated in the meeting.
In addition to budget approved, spillover of previous fiscal (2020-21) amounting to ₹47.33 crore will be carried forward. The scheme aimed at ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education is jointly funded by the Centre and the state on 60:40 sharing basis.
The state government had sent an annual work plan proposal of ₹2,942 crore for upgrading the infrastructure, modernisation and strengthening allied facilities in its schools, citing the increase in student enrolment. The total enrolment in government, government-aided and local body schools is 27.86 lakh.
The plan proposal was approved by the state executive committee set up for implementation of the programme in the state. The state government has been asked to give priority to Right to Education (RTE) entitlements such as free uniform and books, school grants for library and sports, gender equity, foundational literacy and numeracy, vocational training and inclusive education while incurring the expenditure.
The ministry, which appraising the performance indicators and progress made by the state government, also flagged the gross access ratio (GAR), pointing out that there are 26 habitations without access to primary schools and another 18 habitations do not have access to upper primary schools as per the norms. Similarly, nine villages do not have access to secondary and higher secondary schools, according to minutes of the PAB meeting. The school education department was asked to provide details of the children attending schools from these “unserved habitations”. Also, the state government has been asked to continue the process of identifying the out-of-school children with special needs, especially dropout cases due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
