The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : ‘Quality in education, key to future’

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Sep 29, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

‘Quality in education, key to future’

Special Correspondent

It must be promoted for the country’s socio-economic growth, says Minister

‘Education is an instrument of change’
Centre’s funding for education in 11th Plan is Rs. 2.5 lakh crores

Quality time: Minister of State for Planning M.V. Rajashekaran talking to teachers at the National Summit on Quality in Education at Bangalore on Friday. — Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy

BANGALORE: The two-day national summit on ‘Quality in Education’, organised by the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) today opened here today with a call for infusing quality in every part of the learning and teaching process. Speakers at the inaugural ceremony felt that India’s future depended on quality education.

Delivering the inaugural address, Union Minister of State for Planning M.V. Rajashekaran said the promotion of education and technology for a country of India’s size was imperative for progress and socio-economic growth, and hence “we have to look forward to substantial expansion of the provisions, opportunities and quality of education”.

Emphasis on ‘quality’

Mr. Rajashekaran said that many experts, committees and commissions have underlined the importance of education as an instrument of change and progress. Educational institutions should develop a quality perspective, adopting corporate practices such as strategic planning, delegation of responsibility and fixing accountability norms.

Giving details about the present education scenario, Mr. Rajashekaran talked of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan of the Central Government, in partnership with the State governments, which covers the entire country.

The Abhiyan was a flagship programme of the Centre for achieving universalisation of elementary education and to address the needs of about 200 million children.

Quoting the approach paper for the 11th plan, Mr. Rajashekarn said that only about 10 per cent of the relevant age group go to universities, whereas in other developing countries the figure was between 20-25 per cent.

The planning commission found a need to undertake expansion of higher education. The 11th plan aims to increase the percentage of each cohort going to higher education from 10 per cent to 15 per cent by the end of the 11th five-year plan.

Increased funding

The Planning Commission meeting held on September 13, 2007, had announced that the proposed scale of Central Government funding for education in the 11th plan would be almost 2.5 lakh croresin constant prices, which is a four-fold increase over the 10th plan, he observed.

Share in Plan

Mr. Rajashekarn stated that the share of education in the total plan will correspondingly increase from 7.7 per cent to 19.4 per cent.

This reflected the high priority being given to education by the Government. The objective was to raise public spending, of the Centre and the states combined, to 6 per cent of the GDP, he added. The Chairman of the Education subcommittee of the CII Vinay L. Deshpande said that the CII has brought education under greater focus and has adopted it as one of the thrust areas for the country’s growth. In tune with the CII’s theme for 2007-08, “building people, building India,” a central advisory board for human capital was being set up for thought leaders from across various fields to collectively strategise building a global human resource cadre.

The CII has also signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Vishvesvaraya Technological University’s EDUSAT programme where industry top brass would give lectures for the next eight months.

The CII subcommittee on education was also working with the Government’s Technical Education Quality Improvement Project (TEQIP), Mr. Deshpande stated.

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