That educational administration in Meghalaya suffers from congenital disorders is a no brainer. The data released by the Government shows that Meghalaya has many more schools than are needed. These schools have been started on purely political compulsions and later found non-viable because they were poorly administered. Students moved to schools that are better run and these schools opened on a whim were left abandoned but because their names figure in the education department’s list and were receiving regular grants in aid they continued to be funded despite not having enough students or having too few with more teachers. The comparative data between Meghalaya and other North Eastern states has shown that Meghalaya with a smaller population than Tripura has three times the number of schools ( Tripura 4929 and Meghalaya 14,582). Manipur with a population close to that of Meghalaya has only 4,617 schools.
Other reasons plaguing education in Meghalaya are that one institutions features in three or more books of accounts of the Education Department. The Primary section has its own system of grants-in-aid, the middle and high school a different one and the higher secondary sections feature differently, thereby one educational institution gets multiplied at least three times in the books of accounts. This happens due to lack of clarity in grants disbursal and schools take advantage of this opacity to feature their institution as deserving of as many grants as are conceived by the central government.As of today Meghalaya has 206 schools receiving regular grants without having any students while 2,269 schools are running with less than 10 students even while teachers are regularly paid by the government. Then there are Deficit and Ad-hoc schools of which 18 have zero with enrolment and 1,141 have just one student enrolment. There are 30 schools under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan with no enrolment while 268 schools have less than 10 students Among the fully funded government schools, 11 have zero students and 143 schools have less than 10 students. A cumulative data of the amount spent over the years in financing these schools with zero outcomes, would run into thousands of crores. Hence the MDA Government’s attempt to streamline financing cannot be interpreted as an attempt to privatise education.
So the VPP has come down heavily on the MDA Government accusing it of privatising education to benefit only the haves and deprive the have-nots of education. What then is the VPP’s proposal vis a vis the Meghalaya Education Grant (MEG) Policy? The Government had put this Policy up on public platforms and sought for public opinion up to May 31, 2025. It is not known if the VPP or any other stakeholder in education has given any suggestions to the Government for it to act upon. One danger that many perceive could wreck the education system in the state is to empower the School Managing Committee (SMC) to appoint teachers and to manage the administrative affairs of educational institutions. In villages where members of the SMC are near illiterate, how are they expected to take judicious decisions to benefit the educational institution? This and the MEG requires serious public debate.
