Respected
and Hon’ble Madam,
It is learnt that the Government of
Tamil Nadu has taken a decision to do away with economic criterian for
admissions under the RTE Act, in respect of children belonging to the
downtrodden classes and categories of the society like SC, ST, MBC, BC, etc.
In
this regard, we welcome the above step for the above reasons:
1)
The concept of reservation itself has
been on the basis of the status in the society and not on a non-verifiable
economic critetrian.
2)
It is well known that the schools or
the Education department do not have any mechanism to verify the economic
status declared by the parents and even in case of Income Tax assessments,
there is a huge suppression, particularly in cases of non-salaried class,
because, upto Rs. 2 lakhs annual income, IT returns need not be filed and it is
not possible to bring the huge mass of population not filing IT Returns under
scanner.
However,
considering that the total population belonging to the above said deprived
classes and categories will be much more than the presently permitted 25%, and
that the Constitutional obligation is to ensure ‘free and compulsory education
to every child from 6 to 14 years, in such manner as the state may decide’, it
is requested that the Central Government may be urged to
(i)
increase the percentage under RTE to
enable at least every child belonging to the above said deprived categories to
have free education and
(ii)
also to enforce the above benefit of
free education, for the presently studying students of the above said category
also, and not to restrict it to admission stage alone.
yours truly,
(R. Manimohan)
Chairman,
SWAP, CBE
