BENGALURU: Students enrolled at various pre-university colleges (PUCs) across Karnataka are being forced to bear a burden that accrues daily cumulative gain, as they await the distribution of free textbooks that were promised by the state government to be available by June 1. Hitherto, the state government provided free textbooks for only standards I to X.
The distribution of textbooks, which as aforementioned should have been completed by last month, is only getting a staggered start in most districts. According to information shared by the Karnataka wing of the All India Democratic Students Organisation (AIDSO), government PUCs in at least seven districts in Karnataka – Bengaluru, Yadgiri, Hassan, Tumakuru, Mysuru, Bellari, and Raichur – are only receiving partial shipments of textbooks, which are not nearly enough to serve the student bases enrolled there.
Prof. Niranjanaradhya VP, a development educationist, pointed out the fact that the delay will hit students from socioeconomically poorer backgrounds the most. “This is a very important stage of education, and the gap in terms of preparation between the relatively affluent and the underserved will be huge. The rich and urban demographics can manage, with access to other resources of knowledge; for the poor, the free textbooks are often the only available resource. The chief minister should take cognisance of this matter,” he said, adding that rural demographics would be unlikely to access even libraries or stable internet connections.
According to the state vice president of AIDSO Apoorva CM, the setback will be faced almost exclusively by the marginalised, since students from affluent demographics are wont to enrolling themselves at private institutions anyway. “This is the result of the state government’s irresponsible attitude towards socioeconomically vulnerable communities. Education is a basic right; most students from the underprivileged strata have access to only their mobile phones [which are not ideal for accessing online resources],” she said. Notably, most (but not all) of the students affected by this delay would fall just above the cut-off age (16) for the state government’s planned ban on smartphone usage.
Apoorva also deemed this neglect to be seeds sown into a fertile ground for the widespread and steady privatisation of education in Karnataka, and the nation at large.