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Expenditure on Education in India: A Short
Note |
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| Jul
5th 2004, Subhanil Chowdhury & Prasenjit Bose |
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1.
The importance of education in economic development
is accepted across the ideological divide in economic
theory and policymaking. However, what remains common
to the recent phase of market-oriented reforms in India
and the earlier phase of state-led development planning
is the failure to ensure access to basic education for
the masses. The limited spread of literacy and elementary
education till date along with a miniscule proportion
of the population having access to higher education
provides a pathetic spectacle, especially in the backdrop
of tall claims regarding high rates of economic growth
and technological advances achieved during the phase
of economic liberalization. The post-liberalization
period has actually witnessed a gradual withdrawal of
the state from the sphere of education, adversely affecting
both the spread as well as the quality of education
in the country. The advent of the BJP-led government
at the Centre in 1998 further witnessed the consolidation
of two regressive trends in Indian education: motivated
attempts to subvert its secular and democratic character;
and reckless commercialization, particularly of higher
education.
2.
Following the defeat of the BJP-led government in the
recently concluded Lok Sabha elections, a great deal
of enthusiasm to reverse the process of communalization
of education seems to have been generated within the
policy circles. It needs to be understood, however,
that the drive towards such 'detoxification' would remain
half-hearted at best, if larger questions regarding
the role of the state in education remain unattended.
For instance, even if the communally tampered textbooks
of the NCERT are replaced by secular ones, the number
of schools which would adhere to such curriculum is
too scarce to be able to outcompete, let alone totally
replace, the enormous apparatus of school education
put in place by the RSS and its affiliates. Similarly,
no matter how honestly the purging of RSS hacks from
the state-run institutions of higher learning is carried
out, the passage of the Private Universities Bill or
even the continuance of the current dubious practice
of granting deemed university status to all and sundry
by the UGC, would pave the way for their eventual rehabilitation.
A genuine effort to reverse the process of communalization
of education would therefore imply reinventing the vital
role of the state in this sphere. That of course cannot
be achieved without making a departure from the marketization/commoditization
paradigm, the scope for which has been provided by the
commitment to spend 6% of GDP on education made in the
Common Minimum Programme of the UPA government.
3. Table 1 below shows the combined expenditure of the
Central and State governments on education as a percentage
of GDP in the recent years. It can be easily observed
that the total state expenditure on education in the
country has hovered around 3% of GDP, far below the
6% of GDP benchmark set by the Kothari Commission way
back in 1968.
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Table
1 |
Year |
Central
and State Governments' Combined Expenditure on
Education as a percentage of GDP |
1999-00 |
3.3 |
2000-01 |
3.1 |
2001-02* |
3.1 |
2002-03** |
3.1 |
Source:
Economic Survey, 2002-03.
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Notes:
* Revised Estimate, ** Budget Estimate.
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The
inadequacy of resources has stemmed primarily from the
unwillingness of the Central government to undertake
adequate expenditure on education. Table 2 amply demonstrates
the negligible proportion of resources spent for education
through Central Budgets in recent years, with the percentage
of expenditure on education never exceeding 2.5% of
total budgetary expenditure. |
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Table
2 |
Year |
Expenditure
on Education as percentage of TotalCentral Budgetary
Expenditure
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1999-00* |
2.41 |
2000-01* |
2.49 |
2001-02* |
2.21 |
2002-03** |
2.39 |
Source:
Calculated from Expenditure Budget and
Demand for Grants, various years.
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Notes:
* Revised Estimate; ** Budget Estimate
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The
larger burden of expenditure on education is already
being borne by the State governments, which are almost
without exception caught up in a fiscal mess, thanks
to the squeeze on transfer payments to the States and
higher interest rates charged on their borrowings. It
follows therefore that the promise of spending 6% of
GDP on education contained in the Common Minimum Programme
can only be achieved through a stepping up of Central
government expenditure on education.
4. Despite the fact that the proportion of Central Budget
expenditure on education did not experience any increase
during its tenure, the NDA government proclaimed to
have 'prioritized' elementary education by allocating
a greater proportion of resources towards it. This so-called
'prioritization' can be seen from Table 3 where there
is increase in the proportion of total budgetary allocation
on education spent on elementary education (from 39%
in 1999-00 to 43.96% in 2002-03) with a concomitant
fall in the proportion of expenditure on university
and higher education (from 29.58% in 1999-00 to 17.34%
in 2002-03). |
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Table
3 |
Year |
Expenditure
on Elementary Education as percentage of Total
Budgetary Expenditure on Education |
Expenditure
on University and Higher Education as percentage
of Total Budgetary Expenditure on Education |
1999-00* |
39.00 |
29.58 |
2000-01* |
37.74 |
31.02 |
2001-02* |
44.32 |
20.45 |
2002-03** |
43.96 |
17.34 |
Source:
Economic Survey, 2002-03.
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Notes:
* Revised Estimate, ** Budget Estimate.
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However,
this counterpoising of elementary and higher education,
in the name of 'prioritizing' the former, is nothing
but an apology for not undertaking adequate expenditure
in either of the two levels. This becomes evident from
Table 4 that shows only a marginal increase in the expenditure
on elementary education as a proportion of total budgetary
expenditure in the recent years (0.94% in 1999-00 to
1.05% in 2002-03), which calls the bluff as far as 'prioritization'
of elementary education is concerned, while there is
a significant fall in the expenditure on university
and higher education as a proportion of total budgetary
expenditure (0.71% in 1999-00 to 0.41% in 2002-03).
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Table
4 |
Year |
Expenditure
on Elementary Education as percentage of Total
Budgetary Expenditure |
Expenditure
on University and Higher Education as percentage
of Total Budgetary Expenditure |
1999-00* |
0.94 |
0.71 |
2000-01* |
0.94 |
0.77
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2001-02* |
0.98 |
0.45 |
2002-03** |
1.05 |
0.41 |
Source:
Calculated from Expenditure Budget and
Demand for Grants, various years.
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Notes:
* Revised Estimate; ** Budget Estimate
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Such
diversionary tactics need to be strictly avoided. The
Union government should accept the fact that Central
Budgetary allocation on education is abysmally low for
all levels and expenditure needs to be stepped up for
elementary as well as higher education.
5.
Free and compulsory education was made a Fundamental
Right for all children in the age-group of 6-14 years
through the 86th Amendment of the Constitution enacted
in December 2002. The law suffers from the lacuna that
the children below six years of age have been excluded
from its purview. Moreover, the constitutional obligation
towards free and compulsory education has been shifted
from the State to the parents/guardians by making it
their Fundamental Duty under Article 51A (k) to 'provide
opportunities for education' to their children in the
6-14 age group. While setting these anomalies right
remains to be an important objective, what should be
of immediate concern is the financial commitment that
this legislation entails. The Tapas Majumdar Committee
appointed by the government had suggested a required
expenditure of around Rs. 1.37 lakh crores over a ten
year time frame (1998-2007) to bring all the children
in the 6-14 age group under the purview of school education
by 2008. Contributing its bit to the 'India Shining'
campaign on the eve of the elections, the Ministry of
Human Resource Development had publicly claimed through
media advertisements that 3 crores out-of-school children
were already brought back to school after spending Rs.
16,000 crores under the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan. It amounted
to achieving 60% of the target in universalizing elementary
education (i.e. 3 crores out of the estimated 5 crores
out-of-school children brought back to school) by spending
only 0.11% of the total expenditure of Rs. 1,36,922
crores estimated by the Tapas Majumdar Committee. This
was nothing but a perfidious claim being made by the
NDA government in order to conceal its sheer lack of
commitment towards universalizing elementary education.
6. The budget estimates for total expenditure on education
in the interim budget placed by the NDA government this
year was Rs. 11,062 crores, which amounted to around
2.41% of total budgetary expenditure. Out of this, the
budget estimates for elementary education stood at Rs.
6004 crores. The Tapas Majumdar Committee on the other
hand had suggested an expenditure of Rs. 17,000 crores
in 2004-05 for meeting the requirements of universal
school education alone. The gap between the requirement
and what the government is willing to spend is so large
as to make a mockery of the goal of universal school
education. It is here that the UPA government has to
make a decisive break from its predecessor. And it would
do well to remember that the mobilization of adequate
resources for universal elementary education would necessarily
involve taxation of the rich and privileged. A cess
on corporate taxes, personal income tax and customs
duties on luxury imports, to mobilize additional resources
for the Sarva Siksha Abhiyan can be a good beginning
as far as the first budget of the UPA government is
concerned. |
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