Free education for Dalits up to PhD?

NEW DELHI: HRD ministry has asked the Centre to make education free for Dalits up to PhD, in a recommendation from Congress veteran Arjun Singh which can help the party renew its appeal to Dalits but is fraught with serious fiscal repercussions.

While saying that Dalit education in government and aided institutions be free of cost, the ministry has asked the Centre and states to pick up the tab, in an ambitious move which comes at a time when a resurgent BSP is trying to poach on Congress’s dalit constituency even outside Uttar Pradesh.

In another suggestion, the HRD ministry has demanded an annual hike of Rs 65 lakh per district under a key provision of the flagship Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), catering to remedial teaching for SC/ST students.

The twin radical suggestions have been made to a high-profile “committee of ministers on Dalit affairs” headed by Pranab Mukherjee. The committee was formed in the glow of UPA’s surprise victory over NDA, and was part of a raft of pronouncements the coalition made to authenticate its credentials as the champions of inclusive growth, its political riposte to NDA’s “India Shining”.

The Pranab panel was mandated with reviewing all measures for Dalit welfare and suggest upgradation in tune with changed circumstances. The panel, slated to meet on January 24, is to take up reports on six domains but the one on Dalit education could trigger a serious debate, loaded as it is with recommendations of heavy fiscal burden.

The financial implication of free education upto PhD is not clear. It can be daunting, with figures showing there are roughly three crore SC children in schools and several lakh students in graduation and post-graduation courses. Given the premium on education among Dalits and the success of SSA, the numbers are going to grow.

Observers say the costing of education is a difficult task as the fee charged hides the subsidy component, which forms part of education cost. A fee waiver may not find favour with the government as it would push up its subsidy bill besides increasing the actual costs.

The demand for increasing the SSA component from Rs 15 lakh to Rs 80 lakh per district per annum, to provide remedial coaching for SC/ST, would cost an additional Rs 390 crore.

While the two HRD recommendations would probe the government’s intent, with a ‘no’ in the run-up to LS polls having its own political price, the ministry of social justice (MSJ) is pushing for a higher central share in key scholarships for SC students.

The MSJ has demanded disbanding of the concept of “committed liability” for states in pre-matric and post-matric scholarships. A tentative estimate of the present committed liability of 11 states in post-matric scholarship stands at a whopping Rs 1,507 crore. A national figure, sources said, and would be much higher.

‘Committed liability’ is the expenditure incurred on scholarhips in the last year of a plan period, which gets shifted as the burden of states from the next year, with Centre bearing only the spend above it.