The Lok Sabha today passed The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (Second Amendment) Bill 2017 which allows detention of school students in class 5 and 8.
Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javadekar moved the bill which proposed the amendment seeking revocation of ”no detention” policy in classes 5 and 8, enabling states now to allow schools to fail the child if he/she fails in either or both classes and withhold their promotion to the next standard.
The original RTE Act — This was one of the main components of the RTE Act which came into force on April 1, 2010 — stipulated that no child admitted in a school shall be held back in any class or expelled from school till the completion of elementary education.
Moving the amendment bill, the HRD minister said that the amendment was necessary to improve the “learning outcomes”.
He also said that the demands for repeal of ”no detention” policy were made by many states and Union Territories in recent years which observed students scoring “poor marks”.
Replying to the debate in the Lok Sabha on the RTE Amendment Bill, 2017, Mr Javadekar said that it will be at the discretion of the states whether to continue with no detention or not.
The amended Act, according to Indo-Asian News Service, will now have provisions not only for examination in both these classes, but will also extend powers to the state to hold back children, if they fail in re-examination– also provisioned in the amended Bill.
According to the amendment bill, if a student fails in second attempt, he/she can be detained.
“This will ensure a continued study by the students and improve their performance,” the HRD ministry had hoped in a statement.
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“It is a broken education system. We have to rebuild our education system,” he added.
The minister said that in some of the states like Sikkim , Kerala and Telangana, the students ,who were studying in private schools, have come back to government schools.
“Teacher training, quality and accountability are most important,” Mr Javadekar said.
Stating that there was no shortages of teachers, the minister, however, added that the deployment of teachers was not right.
While moving the bill in the Lok Sabha, the minister said, “It is a very important legislation and a majority of state governments supported this Centre’s proposal. It brings accountability in our elementary education system.”
Referring to the no-detention policy in the Act, the Minister said “schools have become only schools for mid-day meal as education and learning are missing”.
According to the minister, the bill has also been analysed by the standing committee and the panel also recommended bringing back the concept of detention in schools.
The policy had been brought as it was felt that compelling children to repeat a class was demotivating, often forcing them to abandon school, he said.
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