Education CAG slams Gujarat govt for deficiencies in implementing RTE

These deficiencies, the report said, include failure to provide basic facilities in schools and setting admission targets without taking into consideration the availability of seats as per the RTE quota. “The state government could not provide basic infrastructure facilities in majority of government schools even after seven years of implementation of the RTE Act,” the CAG report mentioned. The Government of India and the Gujarat government’s share of Rs 3635.57 crore (34 per cent) was short due to under utilisation of funds for implementation of the RTE Act, the report noted.

The CAG also expressed dissatisfaction about the state government’s monitoring mechanism to ensure the proper implementation of the Act, also known as the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act of 2009. The CAG noted that the “monitoring mechanism was weak as Block Resource Centre Coordinators or Cluster Coordinators had not conducted the prescribed number of inspections of schools”.

On RTE Act’s clause for establishment of neighbourhood schools and transportation facility, the CAG report stated that the state government mapped schools in 2011-12 and found the requirement of 201 schools to meet the neighbourhood school norm. “Of these, only 25 schools have been established and made functional as of March 2017. As a result, the number of students identified to be provided transportation facilities due to non-availability of schools in the neighbourhood increased three times from 51,653 in 2012-13 to 1,41,854 students in 2016-17,” the report stated.

Further, during the audit, it was revealed that several primary and upper primary government schools were functioning without any teacher during 2012-17 as against the minimum requirement, it stated.

On the other hand, in the “test-checked” districts, the audit found surplus teachers in 275 primary schools (349 teachers) and 924 upper primary schools (1105 teachers). “The state government could have utilised these surplus teachers in schools which did not have or which had less number of teachers. Thus, even after a lapse of more than seven years since implementation of the RTE Act the state government failed in ensuring maintenance of pupil- teacher ratio as mandated by the Act,” the report pointed out.

The report pointed out that the prescribed pupil-teacher ratio in Gujarat was not achieved in 1,156 out of 10,531 primary schools and 3,098 out of 22,234 upper primary schools as on March 2017. As per the pupil-teacher ratio prescribed under the RTE Act, there should be at least two teachers in a primary school and three teachers in upper primary schools.

Further, the audit found that the local authorities had not provided training to 90,789 (27 per cent) of the 3,41,157 out-of-school children during 2012-17. “Thus the objectives of the Act of increasing the competency level of out of school children for their mainstreaming in appropriate class remained unachieved,” the report stated.

It also observed that the State Advisory Council met only “twice” against 16 meetings to be held during 2013-17.

In its annual compliance report of Gujarat Education Department on implementation of Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act 2009, the CAG noted that the targets for admission to economically weaker section and disadvantaged groups under the Right to Education Act have been fixed by the Gujarat government without considering the mandated provision of the Act.

“The process of fixation of a target was erroneous. The target fixed was much less than the mandated 25 per cent of the seats reserved as per RTE Act. As per DISE (District Information System for Education) data (2016-17), there are total 4,26,510 seats available for admission in Class I of unaided schools in Gujarat. However, against 1,06,628 seats (25 per cent of total seats) available for admission to children from economically weaker and disadvantaged groups, the target fixed was only 46,000 (43 per cent). This indicates that the targets have been allotted by the state government without considering the mandated provision of the Act,” the report stated.

Citing the case of Ahmedabad city, the report stated that the District Education Officer received 17,866 applications as against the target of 18,950 seats during 2013-17. Of these only 13,126 children have been given admission.

Of the remaining 4,740 applications, 2,178 applications were rejected for want of supporting documents, while 2562 children did not join the school due to-allotment of admission is a school other than the one chosen, the schools being far away from residence and allotment in other medium than chosen.

Pertaining to reimbursement of fees (Rs 10,000 or actual fee charged by the school whichever is less) to the private schools against these 25 per cent reserved seats, the report pointed out a delay of six to twelve months by the district authorities.

“In test-checked districts (Ahmedabad and Banaskantha), the district authorities had not reimbursed as of June 2017 fees of Rs 91.28 lakh payable to 377 private schools against 2,121 students admitted under RTE Act during 2014-17. Further, seven talukas — Dhandhuka in Ahmedabad, Anand in Anand district, Radhanpur, Harij, Santalpur, Saraswati and Shankheshwar in Patan district —have not even calculated the fee to be reimbursed to 59 schools for 770 students admitted during 2014-17,” the report stated.

The reason cited by the District Primary Education Officers (DPEOs) of these districts for this delay is “due to late receipt of grant from the Director of Primary Education”.