No effort for better outcomes in education

COMMENT/ Madhav Chavan, Founder, Pratham

The Budget has no major surprises for education. While the finance minister mentioned limitations of governmental delivery mechanism as a bottleneck in social sector, the Budget has nothing that indicates efforts for better outcomes.

The outlays have increased but they are neither inspiring nor indicative of a major thrust. The overall allocation for school education and the literacy department has gone up by about Rs 5,000 crore over 2009-10, but the history of this department is to under-spend, and so the increased allocation does not indicate anything substantial.

The elementary education sector has been allocated an additional Rs 3,000 crore. However, considering that the contribution of education cess to the Prarambhik Shiksha Kosh has been increasing by about Rs 2,200 crore, the government is not adding anything major in this sector in the context of the Right to Education Act.