NEWS ANALYSIS -- What about affordable education?

 

By Kartik Lokhande

In the current atmosphere of political hate-mongering and media attention being diverted to high-profile murder mystery, news of Edula Santhosh Reddy’s death has been relegated to national silence. For, his death raises many basic questions that no one is probably willing to find answers to.

For those who do not know who Edula Santhosh Reddy is, here is a brief: He was a Class X student studying at a private school at Julapally mandal headquarters in Karimnagar district of Andhra Pradesh. A resident of Abbapur village, he committed suicide as his family was not being able to pay the fees and the school authorities made him stand outside classroom along with some other students for long time. Before ending his life, Edula shot a selfie-video and narrated the entire incident that led him to take the extreme step.

Now, this raises an important issue – How to make education affordable to all?

At the root of this question is massive commercialization of education. For the Government, education is neglected sector. This is a result of neglect of the successive Governments. Lofty ideals were set in national policy documents, but when it came to realization of these, unholy trend of appointing teachers considering their ‘paying capacity’ and not their merit set in. Today, in many Government schools, one finds very few teachers who are scholars and inspire students to do better in life. Umpteen number of surveys have pointed out poor quality of manpower being produced in many Government schools spread across the country. As most of the budgetary allocation is being spent nowadays on salaries of teaching and non-teaching staff at Government schools, there is little fund available for equipping the schools to meet the challenge of producing excellent leaders and employable manpower in various fields.

For private sector, everyone will agree, education is just another business segment. So, motive is earning profit. There is scope to suspect that several years ago, educational institutions run by the Government or local bodies were weakened purposely to push people to prefer educational institutions run by private entities. Many private individuals holding powerful positions in the Governments of the day got educational institutions sanctioned to their trusts, business houses, or enterprises.

Slowly, it went to such an extent that it over-shadowed Government in education. And, the officials in the Government took advantage of this position to milk private sector by way of abusing the powers to grant permissions to, inspect and write reports on educational institutions. As this resulted in ‘extra payments’ being made to those in the Government, private sector entities passed on this burden to parents of students studying in their schools in the form of big increase in fees every session. In many cases, fee hike is almost 15-30 per cent every year, which many parents cannot afford as their salaries do not increase in that proportion every year. Some parents still manage it by working over time or double jobs, and some manage by way of getting adjusted into the spiral of corrupt practices.

How commerce-oriented have the educational institutions become could be gauged from the fact that many schools specify the brands and products to be bought by parents for their wards at the start of an academic session. These ‘products’ could be shoes, books, uniforms, and what not. In many schools, even the teachers make it a point to force parents to admit their wards to private tuition classes. Then, there are charges for school/college buses.

When students grow up and they get admitted to college, better-paying companies go to well-branded colleges to hunt talent, as these colleges have right approaches. Instead of emphasizing on finding right talent, companies prefer talents with brands in education sector. And, who does not want his/her ward to get a good job at the end of education? So, parents again herd to ‘bigger and better’ brands of educational institutions.

Of course, there are honourable exceptions to greed-oriented educational institutions. Some institutions do offer quality education at relatively affordable fees. However, their number is few and far between. Sadly, today, people are left with almost no choice than to compete for admitting their wards to private educational institutions. And, this leads them into paying high fees. And, when a parent falls ill or dies or fails to meet the deadline for paying fees for his/her ward, a student is punished. Parents are in such a tight situation that a student like Edula realizes not to trouble parents. At the same time, he wants to get education. But, school wants fees that his parents are unable to pay. Caught between love for parents and desire to learn, finally, a student like Edula feels exhausted of all other options than to end his life.

Shouldn’t Edula’s plight move us all? Shouldn’t it trigger thinking at the levels of Government and private sector on how to make education affordable for all? It must. To start with, the Government must ensure better quality education in institutions run by it through their systematic strengthening. Corruption in Education Department must be rooted out so that school/college managements do not have to shell out extra money to babus. And, wrongs by Government or private institutions should not go unpunished. Also, thought needs to be given increase the coverage of scholarships that are based on economic criterion.

Probably, these steps will lay foundation to ensuring that another Edula Santhosh Reddy does not have to commit suicide for being unable to pay school fees. 

(05-10-15)