Realising that education is fundamental to development and growth of an individual, the State government, in the last two years, has rolled out a series of welfare schemes with an aim to provide children of all sections access to quality education.
Amma Vodi
A total of ₹25,714 crore has been spent on education since June 2019, in addition to ₹1,800 crore being spent on nutrition of children and mothers in the anganwadis, which are set to become Pre-Primary Schools under the Nadu-Nedu programme.
The government has recognised the need to incentivise education, and has, therefore, launched Jagananna Amma Vodi, a scheme that encourages mothers from the economically weaker sections to send their children to school and, in turn, benefit from a financial assistance of ₹15,000 per annum.
So far, ₹13,022 crore has been directly deposited into the bank accounts of the mothers of 44,48,865 students.
From the next academic year, the government proposes to give a choice to the students of classes 9 to 12, to opt between ₹15,000 and a laptop.
The Jagananna Vidya Deevena is designed to ensure that students of the underprivileged sections do not give up higher education. The beneficiaries of the programme are students belonging to the SC, ST, BC, EBC, Minority, or economically poorer sections pursuing degree, polytechnic, engineering and medicine courses, whose full fee is reimbursed in four instalments.
So far, 18,80,934 students have benefited to the tune of ₹4,879.30 crore.
Under Vasathi Deevena, basic needs such as food, accommodation and fee of the students are taken care of by the State through a grant of ₹20,000 in two instalments.
In the last two years, 15,56,956 students have benefited to the tune of ₹2,269.93 crore spent for the purpose.
Vidya Kanuka
The thought of sparing the financial burden of spending money on students’ necessities has resulted in Jagananna Vidya Kanuka. Under this, school kits, comprising three pairs of uniforms, a school bag, textbooks, notebooks, belts, socks and shoes, are given to the students. An English-Telugu dictionary is the latest inclusion in the kit.
Nearly 45 lakh schoolchildren have benefited from the programme that has cost the government ₹781 crore.
Infrastructure in government schools is a focus area, and ‘Mana Badi - Nadu Nedu’ takes care of this aspect.
It is proposed to give a facelift to 45,000 government schools and junior colleges, 151 government degree colleges, 3,287 government hostels, and 28,169 anganwadi centres, all at a cost of ₹16,700 crore in three phases.
Under Jagananna Gorumudda, nutritious food is provided to the students in 45,854 government and aided schools at a cost of ₹1,600 crore.
New initiatives
Further, pushing the agenda of educational reforms, the government proposes to introduce English as the medium of instruction from the primary level in schools. It also plans to implement CBSE syllabus from the 2021-22 academic year. Further, it proposes to introduce English as the medium of instruction in all degree courses from 2021-22 academic year.
