Online and offline classes for non-literates across the state starting today

The state government of Mumbai will start online and offline classes for non-literates aged 15 and above under the 'New India Literacy Programme'. Teachers have boycotted the initiative due to additional work pressure. The government aims to provide education to approximately 12,40,000 non-literate individuals over the next five years. Talks are underway with teacher's organizations to call off the boycott.

Mumbai: The state government, from September 8, will start online and offline classes for non-literates across the state, aged 15 and above, under the central government initiative ‘New India Literacy Programme’ (NILP). Despite teachers boycotting the survey conducted to get a headcount across the state, the school education department chalked out a detailed programme on Thursday.

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To achieve 100% literacy in the country by 2027, the Centre launched a scheme, Education for All (formerly known as Adult Education). The New India Literacy Programme (NILP) has been approved by the Centre with a financial outlay of ₹1037.90 crore for implementation during FYs 2022–23 to 2026–27.

Teachers from across the state decided to boycott this initiative as additional work pressure was placed on them. As per the circular, the government has designated schools as the primary units for implementing this scheme. Consequently, school principals hold the authority for its execution, while the School Management Committees (SMC) are tasked with overseeing its implementation at the village level.

“Under this scheme, we aim to provide education to approximately 12,40,000 non-literate individuals over the next five years. To facilitate this initiative, the department has requested teachers to enroll themselves as volunteers within the next two days,” said Mahesh Palkar, director, educational directorate (projects).

Palkar also said that as per the instruction of the central government, they are arranging baseline and foundational literacy and numeracy on September 24, and therefore the department is starting classes on September 8, on the eve of International Literacy Day.

Opposing this project, Vijay Kombey, state president of Maharashtra state primary education committee, said, “Teachers across the state boycotted this initiative as the state failed to meet our demand of reducing the burden of non-educational work. As a result, in many districts, the state failed to complete the pre-survey. How is the government then planning to implement this programme.”

On the teachers boycotting, Palkar said, “We are having talks with teacher’s organisations to call off their boycott.” Palkar also claims that the pre-survey of this initiative is complete in many districts and that several volunteers are registered with the department.