People's Democracy

THIRD CONFERENCE IN HYDERABAD

STFI Calls For Countrywide Struggle For Right To Education

Yechury releasing a book in the inaugural function of the STFI confernce in Hyderabad. Dr C Ramaiah, P Madhu and Professor Arjun Dev are also seen in the picture.

M Venugopala Rao

THE third conference of the School Teachers’ Federation of India (STFI) gave a call for conducting countrywide struggles against saffronisation and comercialisation of education and for removal of harmful provisions in the Right to Education bill. The two-day conference was held at A Venkataswamy Nagar in Hyderabad. President of STFI, D Rami Reddy, hoisted the flag of the federation. Leaders and delegates of the movement of the teachers, coming from different states, paid floral tributes to the martyrs of the movement.

Sitaram Yechury, CPI(M) Polit Bureau member, MP and former president of the Students’ Federation of India, was the chief guest in the inaugural programme on December 17. Addressing the conference, Yechury gave a call to the teachers to fight for universal education and enlist the support of students and the people in the movement. He explained that globalisation, privatisation, policies of the government and communal ideas had become impediments to universal education and asked the teachers to keep this situation in mind in the course of their struggle. Explaining that 54 per cent of our population were the youth below the age of 25 years and the responsibility of moulding them in the right way lied on the teachers, Yechury made it clear that the future of the society was in the hands of the teachers. Though STFI was of the recent origin, it was leading powerful movements, he said. Noting that discussion was taking place on the issue of providing free and compulsory education to the children between 6 and 14 years, he stressed that there should be right to universal education. Underlining the importance of regulation of private educational institutions, he suggested establishment of state-level agencies on the lines of organisations like the Universities’ Grants Commission. Yechury explained that, in order to control private education, admissions should take place on the basis of rule of reservations, fees to be collected from the students and salaries to be paid to the staff in the private educational institutions should be on par with those in the educational institutions of the government and there should be common syllabus. The proposed bill on right to education should contain all the three points, he emphasised.

Sitaram Yechury recollected the view expressed in the meeting of the council of Unesco that the most skilled people belonged to India and said that despite such reputation all over the world, there were difficulties at the primary level in the country. Compared to the developed countries, school education in our country was neglected, with the rulers not allocating and spending adequate funds for education, he said. Yechury pointed out that after the advent of the UPA government at the centre, resources to the tune of Rs 5600 crore per annum were accruing under the education cess. He suggested to the government to spend these amounts for starting a school in every habitation. Referring to the propaganda of the government that 90 per cent of the allocations made for education was going towards salaries to the teachers, Yechury charged the ruling classes of campaigning against the teachers, without allocating adequate funds. In the process of fighting for universal education, such policies of the government should be exposed, he suggested.

Expressing concern over the impact of globalisation on education, Yechury explained that the governments were depending on the loans of the financial institutions like the World Bank and implementing the conditionalities imposed by them, as a result of which allocation of funds for education was decreasing. Education has become a commodity in the private sector, he said and explained that globalisation itself meant profits above everything else and that there was no room for society and welfare in its scheme. Expressing anguish over penetration of communal ideas into education, Yechury said globalisation and communalism were interlinked. He gave a call to the teachers to fight against globalisation and communalism in the process of their struggle for universal education. Pointing out that the course of discussion in the country had changed – because of the Left parties – Yechury explained that the discussions were today centred around rate of interest on provident fund of employees, right to education, nation building, independent foreign policy, etc. Education with character should be provided to one and all on the foundation of our culture and tradition, he said.

Inaugurating the conference, Professor Arjun Dev, formerly of NCERT, explained that the bill for right to education prepared by the erstwhile NDA government was against the spirit of Article 45 of the Constitution which envisaged free and compulsory education to children below 14 years of age. Even in the present bill of the UPA government there were controversial provisions, he said. The textbooks published during the NDA government were still continuing and the danger of communalism to education was lurking, cautioned Professor Arjun Dev. He suggested preparation of new curriculum and reduction of the burden of syllabus and emphasised the need for reorganising primary education. He said that in order to provide quality education, necessary physical and academic infrastructure facilities should be provided. He asked the associations of the teachers to struggle for achieving education as a fundamental right.

P Madhu, CPI(M) central committee member and MP, said education was beyond the reach of the poorer sections as it was gradually getting commercia-lised. He criticised the governments for not responding to this situation, and in many cases, encouraging this commerciali-sation. He criticised the government for stopping increments to teachers of Navodaya schools under the excuse that they were not achieving 100 per cent passes. Madhu criticised the central government for not responding to the resolution of the state legislative assembly for sanctioning IIT at Basara.

Eminent educationist and co-chairman of the reception committee of the conference, Dr C Ramaiah, and Thomas Joseph, president of AIFUCTO, also addressed the conerence, which was presided over by D Rami Reddy. S Veeraiah, secretary of CITU, R Arun Kumar, president of SFI, and P Buchhi Reddy, general secretary of Navodaya School Teachers’ Union, gave fraternal messages.

In the discussion on the report of the general secretary of STFI, T Punchanan, 27 delegates participated. Altogether 562 delegates and observers attended the conference. The conference elected 70 members to the new general council, which in turn, elected the secretariat members and the executive committee. Kartik Mandal was elected as president and K Rajendran as general secretary. A K Chandran is the joint general secretary and Ch Subash Chandra Bose the new treasurer. Six vice presidents, six secretaries and eleven executive members were elected.

The conference passed 15 resolutions on different issues, including intensification of struggle against imperialism, right to strike against private and foreign universities, against foreign direct investment in education and GATS, against communalisation of education in the BJP-ruled states, etc. The conference announced future course of action, which includes expressing solidarity to the struggle by leading trade unions to increase interest rate on EPF, to carry on struggle against communali-sation and commercialisation of education, to organise taluk, district and state-level seminars and conventions on national curriculum framework 2005 and the right to education bill etc. At the end of the conference, a massive rally was taken out from Sundarayya Vignana Kendram with thousands of teachers from the state and delegates and observers who participated in the conference. The rally culminated into a public meeting at NTR stadium. Kartik Mandal, K Rajendran, Dr K Nageswar of Osmania University, D Rami Reddy and N Narayana, vice president of STFI, addressed the public meeting.