NEW DELHI: The Child Right’s panel has, once again, urged the Centre to form a sub-committee of the Central Advisory Board on Education to specifically bring change in laws to address the issues of quality of education being imparted to children studying in Madarsas across the country.
CABE, under the Union Human Resources Development ministry is the highest decision making body on education policies.
The National Commission for Protection of Childs Rights after carrying out a mapping of Madarsas in India has kept the number of students enrolled in these religious schools at about 2.5 crore and has said that they should be considered “as good as out of school students.”
“While Article 21 (A) of the Constitution provides the right to education to children between 6-14 years , Article 30 allows minorities to establish and administer educational institutions, but there is a conflict in these two rights as the education being imparted in Madarsas is outdated and not in tune with modern times which means that for all practical purposes a large number of students in the country are missing out on basic education,” Priyank Kanoongo, member (education), NCPCR told TNIE.
“The government should therefore make some change in the law to address this concern and modernise Madarsas,” he also said suggesting the Commission has the solution ready to address the issue.
NCPCR team over three months has been reviewing Madarsa and missionary school education in several cities across India including in Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand and has said in a report submitted to the ministry that the quality of education in most Madarsas is not up to mark.
After first raising the issue at a CABE sub-committee meeting in February, the Commission has once again decided to flag the issue to the government. It is also asking for more grants to continue its survey of Madrasas in other states.
These recommendations by NCPCR, which have large policy implications, are being reiterated at a time when several BJP-RSS leaders have also suggested that changes in the existing provisions should be made to standardise minority institutions at par with others.
RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat last year had said that all minority institutions should offer reservations to Economically Weaker Section category students under the RTE act while UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath has been pushing for “modernisation” of Madarsa education and had even cleared a proposal to adopt NCERT syllabus in these religious schools.