Right to Education Sans Development: An Analysis of the Educational Status of Children Living in Slums

Right to Education Sans Development: An Analysis of the Educational Status of Children Living in Slums

India, as a developing country, has been facing many challenges. Of them, providing free and compulsory education to all its children is one such challenge. Despite many efforts by the law makers and executives, education to all the children remains a distant dream. Poverty and accessibility are cited as two important reasons for the short fall. Comparing to their counterparts, the situation of children living in slums is more vulnerable to exploitation. Taking into account this scenario, the present study attempts to understand the various problems faced by the children living in slums in pursuing their education. The researcher is hopeful of getting some valuable insights into the issue to support suitable remedial measures to improve the educational status of children living in slums. Bangalore alone holds around 570 slums and above 5 lakhs of people living in them. The constitution already gives the right for free education, up to 10th standard which can be utilized by them, which in turn can help in free and compulsory education for everyone. If the people are educated they can improve their standard of living and so be able to create an atmosphere altogether better than the slums. The study tries to look upon the role of social and economic situation of children in their education. It also seeks to understand the reasons for the attrition rate and will strive to find out if there is any discrimination the candidate faces while pursuing education. It also focusing the the relevance of the present Right to Education Act, (2010) on the light of data collected. It also tries to find out some solution to improve educational participation of children living in the slums of Bangalore. Education is the gateway to success in life. The importance of education is not realised by all. Education has been thought to bring about a qualitative difference in the life of individuals and groups. Significance is to bring about a social change through information about the provisions of education and the right of every individual to education, it is expected that the demand for education will grow. This consciousness can be brought about through the process of education itself. It is one of the most important responsibilities of the governments and people involved in human affairs to find means and ways to make it available to all on an equitable basis. With an analysis of various articles, books, journals and research findings, the paradigm of the study becomes clear. Review done in the initial stage of the study, equips the researcher in a better way to understand the various concepts, key variables, methods and the history of the topic being studied. Review of literature is a collective body of works done by scholars and published in the form of books or in the form of articles in journals or published as monograph etc. Every research starts with a Review of Literature. These materials are gathered by the researcher from many sources such as journals, books, documents etc. The Researcher feels that it is essential to understand the problems faced by slum dwellers in getting access to education in the selected slums of Bangalore. Researcher also felt it important to compare the slums as they are distinct in terms of their social and economic conditions. For the present study, the researcher has selected two slums in Bangalore urban purposefully which is Bommanahalli and Kannahalli. Each slum is distinct in terms of its character and population. From each slum, 50 households were identified randomly from households with children below the age of 15, either school going or dropouts. The researcher has used the descriptive design for the study. Descriptive research is used to obtain information concerning the current status of the phenomena to describe "what exists" with respect to variables or conditions relating to the educational status of children living in slums. The methods involved range from the survey which describes the status quo, the correlation study which investigates the relationship between variables, to developmental studies which seek to determine changes over time. Researcher has used both primary and secondary data. Primary data which is provided by the researcher is an original one. Researcher has collected these data from the slums selected. For the collection of primary data, the researcher has used Focus Group Discussions, Interview schedule and Interview Guide as tools. From the study researcher has understood that these people are socially and financially backward. Their income is not enough to satiate their daily needs, which makes it further difficult for supporting education. Their backwardness and illiteracy does not give them a proper job. This results in other members of the family including housewives also to work for supporting themselves. Most of the families in order to reduce their expenses have limited themselves to nuclear family structure and also the number of children is a maximum of two. In some families the parents are not taking any initiative in educating their girl child. Most of them consider it is a waste of money. They prefer only the career for their male child. The dropout rates are very high in these two slums. In each year, 20% dropouts are registered. Financial instability or the poverty is the main cause of dropout. Most of the children are going out for work so they are not getting proper time to study. Some of them are facing discrimination from their friends and teachers .High levels of discriminations reported in private schools. Some of them are lacking support from their parents. There is no good school in their locality and the distance of the school is also a main cause for high dropout rate. The parents cannot afford the travelling cost of their children. Less attention by the teachers towards the children is also a reason. People did not know about the RTE Act and its provisions or privileges. Most of them did not get admission on the basis of RTE. Some schools have not properly implemented the RTE Act. The researcher has brought out the following suggestions for the study or the problem. These suggestions are collected from the population selected for the study. The Government should be able to implement the Right to education act. It should be effective in each and every school, rather than being only in papers. Every effort to open more and more schools for the backward section in the society should be taken into prior consideration by the Government in the centre and also within the states. More concentration on educating the slum children should also be initiated and the Government should be able to open schools in the surrounding areas of slum. Right to education act, should not only be an act in papers and something which is kept within protected walls. All efforts for publicity of the Act should be taken in by the government. It should be publicized in such a manner that all the doubts concerning the act be cleared. More and more advertisement or campaign regarding the right to education act and its facilities should be initiated. The privileges of the backward sections be made cleared to them, so that these sections of society are aware of their privileges and are able to use it. All effort should be taken by the Government to provide some more privileges to the backward sections and they should implement that in a proper way.

P.V Tintu

Department of Sociology