By Torist Mark
“Speaker surprised by classification of schools” reads The Shillong Times headline of May 1, 2022. The Speaker questioned the logic of previous governments behind the classification. History will bear witness that this was done over the years to suit the political powers. It’s unfortunate that every government is just satisfied to inherit the problem without any sincere effort to solve it. The State Education Policy 2009 did say, “the existing multi-layered system of grant in aid which is highly skewed in favour of the institutions under the deficit system is undesirable and should be progressively abolished by reducing the categories of grants in aid. The ultimate goal in this area is to have a uniform system for grants- in-aid.” The matter not only ended there. It became more complicated.-
Now we have government schools, deficit schools, deficit pattern schools, adhoc schools, improved adhoc schools, SSA schools, RMSA schools, and private schools. Not satisfied with this confusion we still have single teacher primary schools, schools with excess teachers and schools with less teachers and government schools with two heads in the same building, one for Upper Primary and one for Secondary; one is a government-run; the other is a non-government school. To top it all we have the FASTOM (Federation of All Schools Teachers of Meghalaya) threatening the government with the Sword of Damocles. With the NEET (which has deprived medical seats to most of our toppers), now comes the CUET which will further aggravate the education situation. Education in the state is really mind boggling even to the enlightened.
Let us look at the educational facilities in the state. According to the 2017-18 data which will not differ much now, there were altogether 9310 Primary schools, 3549 Upper Primary schools and 1281 Secondary schools in all Government and Non-Government categories. The total number of teachers was 54,688. The break-up was 9368 (S),17322 (UP) and 27998 (P). The Government teachers are approximately 25,806 and Non-Government 28,882. The average teachers per school were 3 for Primary, 5 for Upper Primary and 7 for Secondary.
Once there was a talk of rationalization of education which will bring in quality education. This will involve physical and financial resources.The financial aspect of different categories as elaborated above will need to scale down to only two categories Government and Government-aided. The physical aspect is more sensitive. For instance, when there are three primary schools in a village of different managements, one with two teachers, one with three teachers and one with a single teacher and if a primary school has five classes, ideally we should combine the three schools into one school with 6 existing teachers. One teacher for one class will bring in quality education. To achieve this will take a great deal of coercive persuasion especially of faith-based management. Similarly in the case of Upper Primary schools, we could improve the quality of education and infrastructure to a large extent and reduce costs at the same time. This is more prevalent in the area of Primary and Upper Primary education.
Coming to the financial aspects. Inside the classroom, dedicated teachers whose only interests are their students are oblivious of the pay and the perks they receive. Its only when they enter the common room or at the end of the month that they begin to wonder why parents or the management are blind to the sweat and the services they have rendered. It all started when the private schools signed a contract with the teachers that the only condition is for a monthly salary that is mutually agreed upon. This contract becomes complicated when the school starts getting government grants. Monthly payment or non-payment to the teacher is linked with getting government grants. Its obvious that the management is responsible for breaking the contract and cannot blame the government for non- receipt of the grant in time. To the government a grant is only a grant. If they don’t have the money the grant can be denied, reduced or delayed. The poor teacher is left in the lurch. Either he has to choose another school or change his profession. The die- hard will take to the streets to agitate against the government. Legally, the government should address this issue with the management, the appointment authority to restrain their employees. It has no legal right to discipline them.
One would agree that the government is seen in a bad light whenever teachers come out in the streets to demand their hard-earned salary which is due to them. Public has all the sympathy for them. Nobody thinks of the original contract the management had with the teachers. Who broke this sacrocant contract? The teachers or the management? Fortunately or unfortunately the government becomes the victim in this tussle and it is unnecessarily dragged into many court cases involving the teachers of these school managements. There are two basic reasons for this. In terms of grants in aid, sometimes the govt. has taken more than it can chew, and in most cases it is due more to reasons of politics than educational or economics. In terms of control it has taken the unnecessary responsibility of approving their appointments. One wonders if this amounts to abrogating the contract the management had with the teacher.
On further analysis, more than 70 % of institutions in the state are non-government institutions. These institutions paid some teachers other than those teachers receiving grants-in-aid. The government should be grateful to these NGOs that they have undertaken to share the bulk of the burden. One can imagine how much the government would have to spend on infrastructure and other expenditures in running these institutions, let alone the salaries. The issue is to examine how the government can improve these non-government institutions and also to examine how to streamline funding so that we have only one type of funding and other service conditions in these non-government institutions. One plausible route is to provincialise non-government schools into government ones whenever possible. Rationalisation and streamlining then can be done by amalgamating or winding up some schools and transferring teachers according to need. They will be subjected to government service conduct rules.
For non-government schools funding will be uniform. The rate is calculated at pay and DA of government pay scales corresponding to teachers of HSS,SS,UPS and LPS. The quantum of the grant is determined by the number of teachers the school is entitled to. This is calculated at the ratio 1:30 (teacher : students ratio ) including Head and Asst Head. Deficit schools used to receive DA and other allowances. These extra allowances will be treated as personal grants which cease when the incumbent retires or resigns. For social security benefits all teachers should enroll in the National Pension Scheme. There was a cabinet decision to create a corpus fund for teachers’ salaries. One rupee of every litre of fuel sold was to go to this fund. A survey of only two petrol pumps in the city informed that they sold about 6000 to 7000 litres a day. One may calculate how much funds are available from all petrol pumps in the state.
The next question is the system of checks and balances and service rules of teachers. There should not be any ambiguity that the grant is given in the name of the school and not the teachers. The management is responsible for the utilization of the grant-in-aid and running of the schools according to government management rules. The contract or appointment letter to the teacher should be duly documented. The government is only to lay down minimum educational qualifications. It will have no hand in approving or disapproving the teacher’s appointment. The teachers are the employees of the management and they are accountable to it. The management rules will lay down conditions of discipline, termination etc., and if there is dispute, the court will be the final authority to dispose of such cases.
The management is also subject to management rules of the government. One important condition is that the school should have its own land and building and have an endowment or reserve fund equivalent to four months salary. The grant may be withdrawn if they violate management provisions. The provisions will also include disciplining their employees and students. The grant may be withdrawn if the school becomes unviable after being given due opportunity to correct itself.
Now that the government has shared all the burden of the salary, the infrastructure and other requirements of the school have to be provided for by the management. RTE rules do not allow school fees but do not prevent parents from giving goodwill donation to improve their schools.
In order to iron out the nitty gritty of financial implications and other modalities it is prudent to set up a Committee/Commission to go into all these aspects.
(The author was former Director, Education, Govt of Meghalaya)