HYDERABAD: Pushing for changes in the proposed Right to Education Bill that was passed at the Lok Sabha in New Delhi, members of the AP Save Education Committee (APSEC) revealed that a delegation of academicians and educationists from the State, numbering close to a hundred has already headed off to the capital on Wednesday to stage a protest, scheduled to be held on Friday.
Insisting that the Right to Education Bill in its present avatar is “flawed,” members of the APSEC said that their main bone of contention at the Capital would be the “exclusion of pre-primary education and subsequent push for a private–public partnership in the State education system,” which, according to APSEC Organising Secretary Ramesh Patnaik is a “flawed outlook to education and tends to exclude marginalised sections of society while privileging others.” The members of APSEC felt that in the case of a private-public model being imposed on the State education machinery, “the decision would be at a disadvantage to poorer and socially backward students, particularly from rural areas with no access to education save government institutions.” APSEC members revealed that the delegation from most of the districts in the State would also protest against the fact “that the Bill does not guarantee the education beyond the eighth standard in school as essential.” The delegates representing APSEC felt that including classes IX and X under the bill would benefit many students in the State. On being asked why the APSEC is pushing for including preprimary (the Kindergarten stage) within the provisions of the Bil, Patnaik clarified, saying: “We strongly believe that if the decision to include the pre-primary age band within the provision of the Bill is implemented, it would benefit children by endowing education as a fundamental human right from a younger age.” Members explained the protest would be based against what the Education Committee felt was the “spirit of the Bill, which reflected the ways of the policy makers.”