Firoz.T.Totanawala The Bangalore Metro Reporter EDUCATION- A DISTANT DREAM? CACL PROTEST THE DELAY IN NOTIFYING RTE RULES, 2009.

By.Firoz.T.Totanawala 

 The Bangalore Metro Reporter 

EDUCATION- A DISTANT DREAM? 

 CACL PROTEST THE DELAY IN NOTIFYING RTE RULES, 2009. 

 Education is the process to awakening which can bring the desired good change for the society. It is therefore saddening that the education sector in India is still far behind and less is done to rapidly foster the spread and reach of quality education to the generation of India. 

 The Right to Education Act is indeed one milestone in the educational empowerment, but, unfortunately it is yet to cross the tables and come for implementation. The Right to Education Act should have actually come into implementation from 1st April, 2010. And it is indeed a matter of concern that a year has passed and the Department of Public Instruction has failed in notifying the rules. If notified, this law can be enforced at least from this current academic year and it empowers children to free and compulsory education. 

 While the primary schools have already started the admissions in the schools, there are incidences already being reported that the primary schools are continuing to violate the provisions of this law. ‘Campaign Against Child Labour’ (CACL), an anti Child Labour organization stepped out and seriously protested the delay in the implementation of Right to Education Act by delaying the notification of draft rules. 

 CACL had already filed comments & suggestions on the draft rules with the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan but there has been no response to their appeals and letters on the status of the same. The finalized draft rules are also not yet placed for public scrutiny and this unreasonable delay by the Department amounts to violation of the UN Convention on The Rights of the Child (UNCRC), ratified by the Government of India. Article 28 & 29 of the Conventions provide for Quality Primary Education without any discrimination to any child. The Right to Education Act passed by the Indian Parliament gives an opportunity to make this right a reality at least to some extent to our children, but is yet to become a reality. 

 CACL suspects that the Department has aligned with the private school lobby to delay the enforcement of this Act and even the Education Department of Karnataka does not want to give the opportunity and hence are delaying the notification of the draft rules. 

To protest against this back ground, CACL –K organized a Protest in front of the offices of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), Nrupathunga Road on 12th May 2011 from 11 to 1 Pm. 

 They unanimously demanded that the Government does not site any kind of lame reasons to postpone the implementation of the RTE. They also warned that anymore delay in the implementation of RTE will call for intensifying their stir throughout the State.