by Sandeep Pandey
The Basic Shiksha Adhikari, Lucknow passed an order on 6 April, 2015, directing the prestigious City Montessori School to admit 31 children under the 25% reservation provision for children from disadvantaged groups and weaker sections under the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009. CMS decided to move the court instead of admitting the children. It cited lack of space and said it had completed its admissions by the time BSA sent his order. The court ordered the BSA to visit the school and find out if there is any space in the school. BSA reported after visitng the school that there is enough space in school to admit the 31 children. Then CMS raised a question that if definition of neighbourhood was taken as 1 km according to government rules then CMS was located more than that distance from children’s homes. BSA was sent again to measure the distances from the children’s homes to the Indira Nagar branch of CMS. 14 out of 31 children were found to be living within a 1 km distance. High Court ordered the admission of these 14 children within a week on 6 August, 2015. However, Jagdish Gandhi refuses to comply. He and his academic daughter Geeta Gandhi Kingdon, the President of CMS, are guilty of violation of law and contempt of court.
The UP Basic Education Minister Ram Govind Chaudhary says that he’ll make the quality of government schools so good that people will withdraw their children from private schools and get them admitted to government schools! The only way the quality of government schools can be improved is when it’ll be made compulsory for everybody drawing salary from the government, all people representatives from the Panchayat members to the Prime Minister and anybody enjoying the benefits of government contracts to send their children to government schools. If this is implemented the situation of government schools will undergo drastic transformation overnight. There doesn’t appear to be any other way in which these schools can be made to function properly. It is not clear when and how the Education Minister of UP will improve the quality of government schools?
If CMS is successful is not admitting these 14 children then it’ll receive very few applications next year also as people will expect that their children would not be admitted easily. On the other hand if children are admitted then every branch of CMS will receive hundreds of applications. This is what worries Jagdish Gandhi. That is why he and his daughter are opposing the admissions tooth and nail.
It is people like Jagdish Gandhi who have become an obstacle in the education of poor children. Whereas countries like Sri Lanka, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam have adult literacy rates of above 90% and young female of age group 15-24 years literacy rate of more than 96%, comparitively India’s literacy rate is merely 63% and young female literacy rate 74%.
Jagdish Gandhi caters to education of the rich children. He runs his education empire like a private company and as a business strategy offers 40% discount in fees to influential people like IAS officers, advocates, MPs, MLAs, judges and most importantly journalists, 20% discount to second line offcials like Circle Officers, no discount at all to the parents who feel the pinch of his high fee structure the most and wants to keep the section which can’t afford education at his institution out of his premises. He can’t imagine that children of poor will enter to the extent of 25% in his school and spoil his business. This is what he is afraid of.
But if people like Jagdish Gandhi are not willing to follow a national law then government should take over the administrative part of his school and properly implement the Section 12 of the RTE Act. If this powerful school falls in line then other schools will follow suit. The owners may run the education programme of his schools but should not have any say in its administration. This will be the first step towards common school system. This is also what Jagdish Gandhi fears. If 14 children are admitted to his school then the government’s education department will get a foot inside the CMS door. Right now he is running the pre-nursery section of his school without any recongnition. Once governemt officials start visiting his schools then he would not be able to violate government’s laws and rules.
An important grassroots transformation is taking place in rural India, especially among the poor. It is not uncommon now to see reports in newspapers about children of daily wage workers making it to IIT. The poor in rural India is now awakened and wants his/her child to be get good education because he/she knows that only this will free his/her family from the vicious cycle of poverty and exploitation. As soon as the poor has enough money with him/her and can afford to send their children to private schools they do so.
When CMS admits 14 students it’ll not just be doing favour to these 14 children but it’ll open the door for thousands of children to avail an opportunity to obtain life transforming education.
Even if all schools admit 25% children from disadvantaged groups and weaker sections it’ll be a very small percentage of all deprived children. Hence it is not possible to make quality education available to all children until the government schools are properly run. The ultimate aim therefore should be Common School System and its inherent concept of Neighbourhood School. The first step in this direction would be to make it compulsory for all people receiving government salary, people’s representatives from Gram Pradhan to PM and people receiving government contracts to send their children to government schools. When children of these privileged sections of society would attend the government schools the condition of schools will transform qualitatively advantage of which will go to all deprived children. This will result in universalisation of basic education and not a single child will be left out of school.
