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The target of delivering inclusive and quality education for all by 2015 in the nine most populous countries may elude a number of developing countries.
At the ninth E-9 Ministerial Review Meeting on Friday, Shashi Tharoor, Minister of State for Human Resource Development, said, “Some countries may face greater challenges than others in meeting the goals by the 2015 target date, and that the quality problem is more acute in the developing world, in part due to the rapid expansion of access.”
The E-9 Initiative, launched in 1993, aims to achieve ‘Education for All’ by 2015. The nine signatories — Bangladesh, Brazil, China Egypt, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria and Pakistan — are home to over 60 per cent of the world’s population, as also two-thirds of the world’s illiterates and half of the out-of-school children.
Tharoor said developing a system of equitable quality education was an equally big challenge, not just for India, but across the world.
“Today, children and youth in low, middle-income and rich countries are not always learning what they are supposed to learn, nor acquiring the knowledge and skills that equip them for the world of work and for active citizenship,” he said.
India on Friday assumed the chair of the E-9 Secretariat from 2012-2014.
Right to Education
The Government has no plans of relaxing the deadline for implementation of Right to Education (RTE) Act.
HRD Minister M.M. Pallam Raju said on Thursday that some State Education Ministers had sought an extension of deadline and a review of RTE implementation would be done. However, sources said the Ministry would not ease the deadline and keep up the pressure on States to accomplish the task before March 31, 2013.
NGOs and local agencies have noted that many States were far from achieving the targets set till March 2013 and some had met only about seven per cent of the prescribed norms.
According to findings of the Central Advisory Board of Education, over 12,000 new schools remain to be opened, while over 2,50,000 additional class rooms and a large number of toilets, drinking water facilities, and ramps are still under construction.
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