Union Minister of State
for HRD Jitin Prasada on Wednesday said that the 12th Five-Year Plan
would focus on quality in education. He was speaking at a function after
releasing the India Infrastructure Report – 2012 at Modern School,
Barakhamba Road, here.
The minister stated that though the
government is "thankful" to the private sector for their efforts in
higher education, private institutes have become "money minting
institutions" and should be discouraged. Speaking on the state of
primary education, he said that schools will be started based on the
public-private-partnership model for world class schools in villages.
The
report, compiled by the IDFC Foundations, also states that the RTE may
force "non-state unregulated" schools to shut down, forcing children out
of school. It also highlights the high dropout rates for SCs and STs,
and states that affirmative action and policy interventions like
reservations and quotas come too late in the educational stage where
they "are not very effective".
A crucial fact highlighted was the shortage of over one million qualified teachers, especially in primary education.