The Telangana government has finally announced the recruitment process for school teachers. The state, which reportedly has the distinction of ranking 35 among 36 states and Union Territories in literacy rates (66.46 per cent), has so far made little progress in taking concrete steps to strengthen school education.
Last year, at a public hearing on private schools before Justice Chandra Kumar and Prof Shanta Sinha, parents of wards going to private schools and teachers working at these schools testified. Some of the schools in Hyderabad charge between Rs 30,000 to Rs 1 lakh for even primary classes. The schools also charge for uniforms, books and other mandatory paraphernalia that should be bought only from the schools at marked up prices. The school buses are an additional cost. If a family has two children, the expenditure can range from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 3 lakh.
After hearing the testimony of several parents, Justice Kumar asked, “Then why do you send your wards to such schools?” The answer invariably was that there was no government school in the neighbourhood. Many new extensions of the city mostly do not have a common school, required as per the Right to Education Act. The Act also mandates that every community must have a primary school within one kilometre and an upper primary school within three to five kilometres.
Ironically, the government, instead of opening new neighbourhood schools, is allowing existing schools to die quietly. And the remaining government schools within the city are completely neglected unless some volunteers step in.
The government has not increased the number of teachers but has forced the teachers to participate in data collection activities. This sends a signal that it is fine for a teacher to stay way from school. Poor infrastructure, shortage of teachers and lack of English medium education have driven students away from government-run schools.
Although there is a demand for English medium schools, the government has not done anything in that regard. And by neither providing pre-primary schools nor merging Angawadis with primary schools, the government has ceded the space to the private operators who capture the lucrative education market early.
Last year, I visited a few villages in Telangana to observe the status of government schools. In Gopalpur, I came to know that a private school opened some 12 kilometres away. The school’s colourful bus was driven by a resident of the village. The children were excited about riding the bus. Meanwhile, the teacher assigned to the government school would seldom make an appearance, despite repeated requests. So, the parents were forced to shell out Rs 12,000 for primary schools, Rs 18,000 for upper primary and anything between Rs 30,000 to Rs 40,000 for high schools. Add to that Rs 3500 for the bus.
In Ram Nagar, Tigul mandal, the Mandal Praja Parishad (MPP) primary school building was in shambles. As a result, the village committee took it upon itself and restored the building. The committee has also appointed a B. Ed, TET qualified volunteer from a nearby village nearby to teach the students.
Angadi Kistapur of Jagdevpur mandal, was even more inspiring. A resident, Omkar Radhakrishna had taken two years to rebuild a school that was about to be shut down. The school that was struggling to stay afloat with 15 to 16 children today caters to nearly a hundred pupils. With more teachers teaching different classes, the children began to perform very well at the entrance exams for residential school admissions.
Now the tide has turned with most village families preferring to send their wards to this school. The Gajwel Area Development Authority built the compound wall of the school. The school still needs two additional classrooms and more teachers. But the parents feel that this school is far more economical and safer. They don’t want to pay hefty fees to private schools or send their wards to a distant school at a young age.
Other schools in the neighbouring villages like Narsampet of Jagdevpur are trying to emulate Angadi Kishtapur to strengthen their facilities and augment their teaching staff. A few things became quite obvious from the visit. There is widespread awareness and desire to educate all children, girls and boys. Education is recognised as a liberating force.
But it is shocking to see that the state has decided to withdraw from whatever little effort it has been making in providing free and universal education. As a result, predatory private players are vitiating the early education market with shocking levels of commercialisation. The state has shown no desire to regulate this market. The teachers, parents, administration and the regulators know why the students are going to private schools even when there are neighbourhood schools.
One reason is the absence of Enlish medium schools and the other is because of the abysmal state of infrastructure and shortage of teachers. During the child enrollment drive, Badi Bata, last year, the government while threatening to close a large number of schools that had low enrolment, asked teachers to go from home to home requesting parents to send their children to government schools. All this while not doing anything to improve the infrastructure or recruit teachers. If they did not succeed, the idea was to close those schools. The teachers were both humiliated and were in despair at the attitude of the government and expected the enrolment to go up.
Hopefully, the new cycle of recruitment is followed by a genuine effort to improve the infrastructure of schools. Any positive move by the government will be met with positive response from the communities. It is the responsibility of the state to preserve the faith of the community that education is a path for empowerment and not just a business.