Chennai: Despite cash crunch, the state government has announced that it will continue the student welfare schemes like free uniforms, school bags and cycles to students.
The government has allocated Rs 1,503 crore for these schemes. It also allocated Rs 758 crore for the free laptop scheme.
Like the previous budgets, finance minister D. Jayakumar has allocated the maximum sum of Rs 26,932 crore to the department of school education, an increase of Rs 2,802 crore compared to last year. While the allocation for higher education department Rs 3,680 crore is more or less the same amount compared with last year.
Though the education sector in total has received more than Rs 30,000 crore this year, the lack of new announcements in the budget caused disappointment among the teachers.
N. Pasupathy, general secretary, Association of University Teachers, said, “We expected the announcements of new government colleges and universities in the budget. We have been demanding for the fee fixation committee to the arts and science colleges. The government also not clearly mentioned the vision or action plan for higher education, allocation of funds to the state universities should have been more.” he said.
While welcoming student welfare schemes in the budget, Sami Sathiamoorthy, state president, Tamil Nadu High and Higher Secondary Schools’ Headmasters Association, said, “The government should upgrade schools only where there is a demand. They have to send an inspection team to the schools before upgrading them.”
The government announced that 150 middle schools will be upgraded to high schools and 100 high schools to higher secondary schools during 2017-18.
This year, the state government has allocated Rs 201 crore for RTE admissions. So far, 3.28 lakh students were admitted to private schools under this provision. The state government also mentioned that the central government is yet to release its share of Rs 1,476 crore and Rs 1,266 crore for the SSA and RMSA schemes as arrears for the previous years.
