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| In election year, social sector gets a leg-up |
| BS Reporter / New Delhi Feb 17, 2009, 00:12 IST |
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BHARAT NIRMAN: Elementary education expenditure outlay at Rs 19,682.96 crore is higher than the Rs 19,488.62 crore (revised estimates) in 2008-09.
The Interim Budget 2009-10 proposed to step up the education expenditure for 2009-10 under various heads. A new scheme for universal secondary education was also proposed, along the lines of the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan (SSA) which seeks to attain complete primary education in the country.
Elementary education expenditure outlay for 2009-10 at Rs 19,682.96 crore is higher than the Rs 19,488.62 crore (revised estimates) in 2008-09. Secondary education outlay has risen from Rs 4,056.79 crore to Rs 6,170.20 crore, while higher education spending has risen from Rs 11,340 crore to Rs 13,179 crore.
SSA will receive Rs 4,239.23 crore in 2009-10, which is slightly less than the Budget estimate of Rs 4,250 crore and lower than the revised estimate Rs 4659 crore for 2008-09.
The mid-day meal scheme has got an allocation of Rs 5,279 crore in the Interim Budget for 2009-10. The scheme was launched on August 15, 1995, in 2,408 blocks across the country. Gradually, the scheme has been extended to all the blocks in the country.
Inspired by the success of SSA, which has seen a massive increase in the number of students completing education till the upper primary level, the Interim Budget launched a new drive to universalise secondary education with an allocation of Rs 210 crore for the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan.
On the health side, the integrated child development services, meant to stop malnutrition and mortality of children under six years, got Rs 6,705 crore for 2009-10, which is more than Rs 5,665 crore allocated in the current year in both revised and Budget estimates.
The National Rural Health Mission under the health ministry has been allocated Rs 12,070 crore in the Interim Budget with additional funds for setting up institutions modeled after the All India Institute of Medical Sciences and for providing teaching and training facilities in medical colleges run by states. The funds for this have increased from Rs 568 crore to Rs 647 crore.
The Interim Budget has announced two new schemes: The Indira Gandhi Widow Pension Scheme to give a pension of Rs 200 per month to widows in the 40-64 age bracket and the Indira Gandhi National Disability Pension Scheme to provide pension for severely disabled persons.
Bharat Nirman, which provides the six-fold social empowerment package to rural masses in the form of housing, drinking water, rural connectivity, telephony, electrification and irrigation, got an allocation of Rs 40,900 crore in the Interim Budget. So far, the allocation to this programme has increased by 261 per cent since it was launched in 2005. The allocation for the programme in 2008-09 was Rs 31,280 crore.
The allocation for the Pradhan Mantri Grameen Sadak Yojana, which is a part of the package, has been increased from Rs 7,225 crore in the revised estimate of 2008-09 to Rs 9,135 crore in the Interim Budget.
The allocation for Indian Institutes of Technology has gone down from Rs 1,685.39 crore in 2008-09 (revised estimate) to Rs 1,605.07 crore in 2009-10. This includes Rs 600 crore to meet the recommendations of the Oversight Committee for taking in more students. Another Rs 200 crore has been set aside for setting up new IITs. The allocation for Indian Institutes of Management has been stepped up from Rs 111.04 crore in 2008-09 (revised estimate) to Rs 120.71 crore in 2009-10. Out of this, Rs 60 crore has been earmarked for implementing the Oversight Committee’s recommendations.
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