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The MCD has been allocated a whopping Rs 1441.76 crore (that’s 144,100 lakh rupees!) for primary education in the year 2010-11. View this colossal sum against the fact that MCD primary schools cater to around 10 lakh children. In effect each and every one of the 10 lakh children in MCD primary schools has been allocated Rs 14,410 towards her/his education during the current year.

So let’s try and figure out how that money could be spent this coming year. Let’s assume we can accommodate a healthy 25 children per classroom (right now many MCD schools cram over 100 children belonging to two or more classes in a single classroom!). Let’s then draw up a simple table, using liberal cost estimates, to show how much it will cost to  provide basic infrastructure and amenities to each class of  25 children and their teacher, and thereby how much it will cost to provide such amenities for all 10 lakh children and their teachers in MCD schools (Table 1):

Table 1. Annual costs for improving amenities and infrastructure in MCD schools (items listed for each class of 25 children)

* MCD cannot be trusted to provide safe piped drinking water to the schools; hence, a stand-alone water cooler is far more practicable.

As the table shows, it will cost the MCD just Rs 392 crores during this year (out of its sanctioned Rs 1441 crores) to provide all the 10 lakh children and their teachers in its primary schools with spanking new furniture, clean drinking water, decent lavatories, fans for the summer and even room heaters in winter. The MCD would still have over Rs 1000 crores left over in its primary education account for 2010-11: ample to cover the salaries of teachers and others during the year, as well as spend on further improving school infrastructure.

Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? Indeed, the figures don’t lie (which is more than can be said about our government and its denizens). But then the MCD has had its grubby hands on similar sums of money for primary education year after year, for decades. So why has nothing changed in the MCD schools? Where has all that money gone? No prizes for guessing.

Maybe the time has come to privatize all the MCD schools. Or else, let us rename the ‘Education for All’ movement as Sarva Shiksha Apmaan.

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