A panel discussion on the release of a new report, by the Human Rights Watch at the India Habitat Centre, saw panelists throw light on the gaps that exist in the implementation of the 'Right to Education Act' .
The discussion on the report pointed to the fact that the nation was in poll mode, and when the new government assumes charge the Right to Education Act is made successful and that children gets to study in a more congenial atmosphere.
Jayshree Bajoria, South Asia researcher at Human Rights Watch ,who prepared the report recounted stories which showed how deeply insidious and covert form of discrimination was practiced right inside the school itself.
She narrated horrifying accounts of how marginalised children such as the dalits, tribals and the muslims who were not made to feel at ease when they were at school.
The handout of the report mentions how the RTE is in shambles where a student is made to clean toilets made for the teachers. In another case a teacher asked his pupil to massage his legs and when the student refused he was beaten. While the most shocking was how a teacher went to the extent of calling a student as dirty and hence asked him to sit in the back benches.
Bajoria remarked that this endemic problem is so deep rooted that when she interviewed some teachers they did not feel any remorse while committing such inhuman acts on dalit and tribal children. She said that there were no proper monitoring mechanisms in place to check what was going wrong in the system.
Vimala Ramachandran, national fellow at the National University of Educational Planning and Administration, Government of India, stated that the school was a sight of discrimination which is not officially recognised in government files. She said that discrimination was a form of violence and that was blatantly reflected on the kind of tasks assigned to students by the teachers.
Ambarish Rai, national convenor at Right to Education Forum, remarked that it was the right time that the report has come to raise the issue before the political parties who must be held accountable that serious anomalies are in place in the education system especially in government schools. He gave an estimate that just a meager 12 percent of RTE Act was implemented in Gujarat, while an abysmal 1 percent was implemented in Amethi, in Uttar Pradesh. He said even after the constitution came into effect in 1950 and universalisation of education was promised within ten years of its coming into effect, but nothing has been achieved since then. Even the ambitious RTE act which had set a target has also remained ineffective and remained just on paper. Rai rued the fact that the teachers' training institutes had collapsed and said that the government was focusing more on Kendriya Vidyalaya's.
Annie Namala, executive director at the Centre for Social Equity and Inclusion, emphasised the fact that the audio-video presentation which was shown right at the beginning before the discussion began highlighted a contradictory fact that it was the children who were asking the teachers to impart them education.
Sadly, the Ministry of Human Resource and Development (MHRD) guidelines were not seeing the light of the day. She stressed that the states should implement it.
CSEI director, said that the reflection of the society shows in schools first. She rued the fact that no studies were being done to assess whether discrimination lead to dropouts. She questioned the Government of India for not being a signatory to the UNESCO's convention on education.
Annie Namala, pointed out that the grievance addressal system was not in place. She urged upon the larger society to take it upon themselves to ensure that there was a semblance in the education system so that the morass which exists vis-a vis RTE Act where children are blatantly discriminated could be arrested.
Following the discussion, it was evident that there was a need to have a proper model -code- of- conduct, for the teachers to be in place which is absent right now. It also called upon the system to be changed so that overt discriminations happening in schools are nipped in the bud and all children belonging to any strata be it muslims, dalits or tribals get equal treatment like any others without any prejudice.