CHENNAI: State Higher Education Minister K. Ponmudi on Saturday sought the support of teacher organisations in realising the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam government's efforts to bring education into the State List, from the Concurrent List, in the Constitution.

He was inaugurating a seminar on `Share Knowledge: share development' organised here by the All India Federation of University and College Teachers Organisations (AIFUCTO) as part of its annual academic conference.

"After six months of efforts, I now realise the difficulties in realising the goal. Education should either be in the Central or State list ... there are problems with the subject remaining in the Concurrent list," he said.

The State was trying to regulate the working of private and self-financed institutions, but the regulations or rules were in conflict with the Central rules.

"Our government is convinced that education should be with the State list, especially for meeting the ends of social justice and further democratisation of education," he said.

Noting that teacher organisations were now changing their outlook from mere activism to acting with social responsibility, Mr. Ponmudi said the theme of the seminar was evidence to this trend.

Teacher organisations such as AIFUCTO should support the States' cause to bring the subject `Education' back into the States' List in the Constitution, he added.

At the conference and at the seminar hosted by the Association of University Teachers (AUT - Tamil Nadu) on Friday, leaders of teachers organisations urged the Union and State governments to step up funds significantly towards education to combat illiteracy and livelihood opportunities for the country's youth. They wanted the Governments to allocate at least 6 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product for education.

Inaugurating the meet, University of Madras Vice Chancellor S. Ramachandran said there had been a remarkable development in the field of education since independence - from 500 colleges then to 17,625 colleges in the country now. But only 1.5 per cent of people below the poverty line had access to education. This must be increased for the nation's development, he said.

He wanted the recommendation of the Kothari Commission on spending six per cent of the GDP on education to be taken up for implementation in the forthcoming XI Plan.

In Tamil Nadu, the expenditure on education had witnessed a steady decline. From 3.7 per cent a few years ago, the allocation of funds towards higher education has dropped to 2.1 per cent in 2004-05, Mr. Ramachandran said.

Quality education

Besides access and equity of education, the government also needed to focus on quality education. Mr. Ramachandran later released the souvenir of the AIFUCTO.

A. Ramasamy, vice chairman, Tamil Nadu State Council of Higher Education, said the drafting of Common Universities Bill for 20 universities across the state was underway.

Globalisation

AIFUCTO president Thomas Joseph said higher education facing a threat due to globalisation and privatisation. The conference was a preparatory meeting to gather teacher community in view of the countrywide strike on December 14 against globalisation policies.

AIFUCTO general secretary V.K. Tewari said the Fundamental Right to education must be extended to tertiary education for the empowerment of people.

Only 18 per cent of the youth population had completed higher education.

The conference also marked the diamond jubilee celebrations of AUT. N. Senthamarai, AUT president, and vice-chancellors of several universities participated.

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