PM outlines ambitious growth plan for economy

Singh announces the opening of 6,000 new high quality schools in each block of the country, reports Chetan Chauhan.

Updated on: Aug 15, 2007, 23:48:39 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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To ensure benefit of growing economy reaching young Indians, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday outlined an ambitious plan for skill upgradation and quality education for all.

Addressing the nation on Independence Day, Singh announced the opening of 6,000 new high quality schools in each block of the country to set standards for other schools in the region. After achieving a “fair degree of success” in primary education programmes, he promised that the plan for universalisation of secondary education will soon be finalised.

He also assured the states for opening new 370 colleges, especially in districts where enrolment is low. “I am sure that we can ensure that at least a fifth of our children go to college as compared to one-tenth now,” he said.

Prime Minister Singh, however, admitted that the university system had been relatively neglected in the recent years but said the government is now ready with the plan to open 30 new Central Universities, thereby having at least one central university in each state.

The PM plan had a special focus on science education, which the scientists had termed in shambles. He announced setting up of five new the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research, eight new Indian Institutes of Technology, seven new Indian Institutes of Management, and twenty new Indian Institutes of Information Technology.

With new education institutes, Singh also delved on a highly ambitious plan to provide skills to 100 lakh students every year, a four-fold increase from present level, as per the market needs. This will be achieved through Vocational Education Mission, which will open 1,600 new industrial training institutes and polytechnics, 10,000 new vocational schools and 50,000 new Skill Development Centres, the PM said. He, however, sought help of the private sector in not only helping in training but also in providing employment opportunities.

Explaining a need for such a plan, the PM said, “For every one of our people to benefit from new employment opportunities being created across the economy, we must ensure that every Indian is educated and skilled”.

He also called upon the nation not to seek functional literacy but good quality, affordable, accessible and equitable education for every “boy and girl” who seeks to study. “I wish to see a major revolution in the field of modern education in the next few years,” he said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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