SSA

The state governments will now have to bear the entire cost of fee reimbursement to schools under the Right to Education Act as the centre will not provide financial aid to any state this year. According to sources, the proposal of the Ministry of HRD to support states in a 65:35 cost sharing ratio is still pending before the union cabinet. “Not just Karnataka, no other state will receive finance from the centre. That is why the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) has no provision for fee reimbursement in its budget this year,” said an SSA official. Karnataka’s Minister for Primary and Secondary Education Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri, who has been stressing on the need for the centre to financially support the state to reimburse schools, maintained that the centre has to ‘prove its commitment’ by supporting the government. Meanwhile, the Department of Public Instruction has issued circular asking block education officers to make a final list of admissions made under the RTE quota and calculate the total amount of reimbursements to be made (separate calculations for class I and pre-primary). This information has to be submitted to the Director (primary education) before 15 September 2012.