The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Campaign for child education

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Apr 26, 2007
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Campaign for child education

Staff Reporter

MISSION EDUCATION: Children taking out a rally asserting their right to education as part of a State-level event organised by CCF-India in Chennai on Wednesday. — Photo: R. Ragu

CHENNAI: A host of programmes, including a rally by 1,000 children highlighting the significance of school education for every child, marked a State-level event organised by the CCF-India at Egmore on Wednesday.

The children also formed a human chain to reiterate the message that children deprived of education must be provided their right.

The event was organised as part of the CCF-India's week-long campaign to go on till Sunday to highlight children's education. Let's make sure every child goes to school — this was the message the event sought to convey.

The State-level event also called for a comprehensive poverty mitigation programme covering families of school dropouts to help enable the children to complete their education.

Former member of the State Human Rights Commission R. Rathnaswami said non-governmental organisations played an important role in creating income generation opportunities for underprivileged families. Besides government initiatives, community participation at the grass-roots level was also imperative to achieve the goal of education for all by 2015, he said.

Chairperson of Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board Salma said education was the only way the country would progress. Parents must take on the responsibility to ensure education for their children. She said projects such as the noon meal scheme were instrumental in improving the education and health of the children.

Finance Controller of CCF-India (Bangalore) Hemanth Kumar said despite several measures to improve enrolment of children, retention rate at schools had not gone up. At many places in the country, dropout rates were as high as 70 per cent at the high school level and 40 per cent at the middle school level, he said.

CCF-India, which supports about one lakh children across the country, proposes to organise a national-level event in New Delhi on Saturday.

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