Fwd: [aifrte] Press Release issued by the All India Forum for Right to Education (AIF-RTE)

[Guest guest]

---------- Forwarded message ----------AIF-RTE <aifrte

2009/11/12[aifrte] Press Release issued by the All India Forum for Right to Education (AIF-RTE)aifrte 

 

 

 

 

 

ALL

INDA FORUM FOR RIGHT TO EDUCATION

306, Pleasant

Apartments, Bazarghat, Hyderabad-4

Tel.: (040) 2330-5266

______________________

PRESS

RELEASE

09

November 2009/ New Delhi

 

 

Here is the Press Release (also in

attachment) issued by the All India Forum for Right to Education (AIF-RTE) on 9th

November 2009 from New Delhi at the conclusion of its two-day ‘All-India

Consultation on Building a Movement for Right to Education’ held on 7-8

November at the Delhi University campus in collaboration with the Equal

Opportunity Cell, Delhi University.

 

 

The

All India Forum for Right to Education (AIF-RTE) organized a two-day national

consultation

at the Delhi University campus on 7-8 November 2009

on ‘Building a

Movement

for Right to Education’ which was attended by the representatives of several

teachers’

and students’ organizations, Right to Education groups, social movements,

intellectuals

and activists from 13 states of India.

The national consultation expressed a

deep

concern over the rapidly deteriorating condition of the education system from

preprimary stage to higher and technical education. The national consultation

unanimously noted that,

 

 

1.

The recently enacted ‘The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education

Act,

2009’ (henceforth referred to as the ‘Right to Education Act, 2009’ or simply

as

the ‘RTE Act 2009’) is designed to (a) enable the State to abdicate its

Constitutional

obligation towards providing elementary education (class I-VIII) of

equitable

quality to all children in the 6-14 year age group; (b) demolish the entire

government

school system except the schools of certain elite categories (e.g.

Kendriya

Vidyalayas, Navodaya Vidyalayas, XI plan’s 6,000 model schools, and

similar

elite schools of the States/UT governments); and © increase the pace of

privatization

and commercialization of school education. This Act would provide

neither

free education nor education of equitable quality. Rather, it would legitimize

and

maintain the multi-layered school system built through World Bank’s District

Primary

Education Programme (DPEP) during the 1990s and Sarva Shiksha

Abhiyan

(SSA) during the present decade. The central agenda of the Act is clearly

to

privatise and commercialise the school system through neo-liberal schemes such

as

Public Private Partnership (PPP), school vouchers, adoption of schools by

corporate

houses, religious bodies and NGOs.

 

 

2.

The decision of the government to provide for profiteering through education

has

dangerous

socio-political implications for the stability, solidarity and sovereignty of

the

country.

 

 

3.

Public Private Partnership (PPP), which includes school vouchers, outsourcing

and

adoption

of schools and colleges, is aimed at shifting of public funds to the

corporate

capital through the back door for unbridled profiteering.

 

 

4.

The Yashpal Committee Report on higher and technical education is a package of

contradictions

but, in the ultimate analysis, it rationalizes and supports the neoliberal

agenda

of privatisation and commercialisation of higher education

institutions,

PPP and differential fee structure; and welcomes second grade (or even

worse)

foreign universities and Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). What is of even

greater

concern is that it fails to propose any credible plan for improvement of the

quality

of the existing 18,000 colleges and 400 universities in the country. Its

recommendation

of replacing the existing regulatory bodies such as UGC, AICTE,

NCTE,

MCI and others by a high empowered single window National Commission

of

Higher Education and Research (NCHER) would enable it draw its resources

directly

from the Ministry of Finance, thereby making it unaccountable to the

democratically

mandated Ministry of HRD. This is certainly a prescription for

unbridled

privatization and commercialization of higher education as well as entry

of

foreign universities and FDI.

In

light of the above, we urge upon the Union Government to,

i)

replace the RTE ACT 2009 with a new Act drafted in the framework of the

‘Common

School System based on Neighborhood Schools’ in consonance with

the

basic spirit and principles enshrined in the Constitution;

ii)

review the 86th Constitutional Amendment

Act (2002) with a view to providing

a

Fundamental Right to free and compulsory education of equitable quality to

all

children

until the age of eighteen years i.e. until class XII, including early

childhood

care and pre-primary education;

iii)

create all necessary provisions within the Common School System to

educate

the disabled children therein, except in the case of certain extreme forms

of

disabilities for whom Special Schools may be required;

iv)

incorporate a Constitutional guarantee within the Act for providing

adequate

funding for the entire school system, including early childhood care and

pre-primary

education. This is precisely the implication of a Fundamental Right;

and

v)

include in the Act a provision to completely ban all forms of privatisation

and

commercialisation of education, especially Public Private Partnership

(PPP),

adoption

of schools by private agencies, outsourcing and voucher schools.

In

addition, we demand that,

1.

All private schools, aided or unaided, should be taken over by the government

and

handed

over to the Local Bodies for management, except in the case of those

charitable

societies which give an undertaking to fulfill the same Constitutional

obligation

as a Government or Local Body school, including, among others,

providing

free education of equitable quality as a Neighbourhood School

and

appointing

teachers under service conditions and salary scales applicable to the

government

school teachers.

2.

Upgrade the status of all Para Teachers previously appointed in schools under

DPEP

and SSA since the 1990s and include them in the cadre of regular teachers,

while,

at the same time, ensuring that their educational status through pre-service

and

in-service education is taken care of by the government, including its cost.

3.

Enact legislation to ban all forms of privatisation and commercialisation at

all

stages

of education from pre-primary stage to higher and technical education, with

severe

penalty clauses against profiteering.

3

4.

All forms of Public Private Partnership (PPP), including school vouchers,

adoption

by

private parties and outsourcing, must be banned through legislation forthwith.

5.

The State must ensure that entirely free education of equitable quality is

available

at

all stages of education from pre-primary to higher and technical education (“free

education

from KG to PGâ€).

6. No

foreign university should be allowed to function in India either directly or

indirectly.

7. Foreign

Direct Investment (FDI) in education has no place at all in a country that

is

required under the Constitution to become a “sovereign, socialist, secular,

democratic

Republicâ€, apart from being entirely inconsistent with the principles of

equality

and social justice enshrined therein.

8.

The “offer†of higher and technical education made by the Govt. of India to the

GATS

Council must be withdrawn forthwith, lest they become “commitmentsâ€.

9.

The entire education system must be reconstructed to build a democratic,

socialist,

secular,

egalitarian, and enlightened society and to protect the sovereignty of India,

on

the one hand, and the democratic and human rights of the masses, on the other.

The

national consultation decided to undertake the following three-point programme:

1.

Organise a massive march to the Parliament during the forthcoming budget

session

of the Parliament in 2010.

2.

Open a sustained dialogue with various section of society including the dalits,

tribals,

OBCs, minorities, disabled and the nomadic, displaced and migrant

population,

especially the women in each of these sections of society, with a

view

to building a common understanding for moving towards a pro-people

and

democratic education system in India

founded on the principles of equality

and

social justice.

3.

Undertake Pad Yatras throughout the country in order to carry forward

the

Right

to Education movement to the district and Block levels.

Members

of the Presidium, Secretariat and National Council,

All

India

Forum for Right to Education (AIF-RTE)

1. Prof. G. Haragopal, University of Hyderabad.

2. Dr. Meher Engineer, President, Indian Academy

of Social Sciences.

3. Prof. Anil Sadgopal, Former Dean,

Faculty of Education, Delhi

University & Former

Member, CABE.

4. Prof. Rama Kant Agnihotri, Deptt.

of Linguistics, Delhi

University.

5. Ms. Madhu Prasad, Zakir Husain

College, Delhi University.

6. Sh. Kedar Nath Pandey, General

Secretary, Bihar Madhyamik Shikshak Sangh.

7. Sh. A. Narasimha Reddy, Vice

President, A.P. Save Education Committee.

8. Sh.. Prabhakar Arade, President,

All India

Federation of Elementary Teachers

Organisations.

9. Sh. Jagdish Pandey, President,

U.P. Madhyamik Shikshak Sangh.

10. Dr. V.N. Sharma, President,

Jharkhand Vigyan Manch.

11. Sh. Ravi Rai, General Secretary,

All India

Students Association (AISA).

 ------

Secretariat

All India Forum for Right to Education (AIF-RTE)

New Delhi

http://in.aifrte/

Try the new India Homepage.

 

 

 

-- Dr.V.N.Sharmahttp://tinyurl.com/vnsharmaMember, AIF-RTE Secretariat " Those who have the privilege to know, have the duty to act. " Albert Einstein

" The only thing necessary for Evil to Flourish is for good men to do nothing " Edmund Burke

 

 

1 of 1 File(s)

 

 

 

 

 

AIF-RTE_Delhi Consultation_Press Release_English_09Nov09.pdf