Aheli Moitra
In 2003, the action of an individual to assert his rights brought a powerful judgment from the Bombay High Court. Dhawal Chotai, born with cerebral palsy, was denied three extra hours to write his Chartered Accountants (CA) examination. He wasted no time in moving the Bombay High Court against the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India (ICAI). In its judgment, given the same year, the Bombay High Court held the “right to receive education and facilities for it” to be read within the right to life.
Dhawal qualified as a CA in 2006; today he works as an Assistant Manager in an IT firm. Following his case, two other students with physical disabilities accessed their right to better education facilities.
In 2009, following a series of many such related and unrelated struggles, the Government of India passed the Right to Education (RTE), or Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, guaranteeing access to free, compulsory and quality education for all aged 6-14. In the 2012-13 annual budget, the Union government allocated Rs. 25,555 crore for the 220 million students in schools across India to access the RTE.
But children continued to fall through the cracks. Missing school buildings and rotting infrastructure is not the saga of Nagaland alone; parents from poorer sections were shown little incentive to send the extra working hand to school. Noticing the government’s lack of will to rise above corruption and private schools refusing to let go of profit, parallel institutions stood up for rights. A bit after the right to education was recognized, one such, Diksha Foundation (Bihar) came into being with a stated objective to educate and empower children and adults, with special focus on the girl child. Its team went to each family in Patna’s poorest colony, located atop a train track, and asked parents to enroll their children. Many refused. Then slowly, and guarded, they sent the children. Today, nearly 200 children study in Diksha classrooms, some through computers, all for free.
The result of these struggles, to affect the collective and individual right to education, is being felt in Nagaland too. But marginally so. Like its high percentage of voter turnout is exemplary of how much democracy exists in the state, its high literacy rate shows its level of education. In 2011, 80.11% of Nagaland’s population stood literate. Yet, educators suggest that kids from rural areas cannot construct sentences when they reach a graduate level, leave alone complex mathematical or scientific formulae. Nor can some teachers at the primary level. Nothing more can be said about the lapse of governance to ensure quality education than this.
Serious allegations have been made against the state government—educationists say the government does not recognize the importance of education as the backbone of society. If this is the case, no RTE can help. The culminate effect of this on the Naga economy is tragic—no skill can be developed within the state to set up industry. Without quality education at the primary level, skill at a tertiary level cannot be moulded. Without local expertise and skill, any industry, small scale or large, will result in being exploitative of the local populace. If the state cannot ensure the quality of education resulting in sustained progress, it loses the right or legitimacy to push for industry, resulting in overall backwardness of the people.
Following examples stated above, people today can choose to fight for their right to education individually or institutionally. Through these actions, the state’s capability to bring education to all can be strengthened. The onus of progress is not the state’s alone, and should not be, but the rupees to ensure progress lies in its pocket, and citizens have every right to ask for what belongs to them. This includes the right to a quality life through quality education.
