Solidifying education base, Tribal women show a high rise in literacy rate!

NewsBharati    13-Mar-2018
Total Views |

New Delhi, March 13: Strengthening the base for education and encouraging the importance of literacy for all has always been a strong motto around the country. Education has been termed as a path-breaking revolution for the country and therefore there are various schemes especially for the tribal section. The Tribal Affairs Ministry has released around Rs 231.5 crore in last 6 years for solidification of education among Scheduled Tribes (STs) in 54 low-literacy districts.

In the Lok Sabha session the information regarding the funds was given by Jaswantsinh Bhabhor, State Minister of Tribal Affairs. Under the scheme "Strengthening Education among ST Girls in Low Literacy Districts", funds were released between 2012-13 and 2017-18.

The scheme targets at bridging the gap in literacy levels between the general female population and tribal women. Besides this, the other objective of the scheme focuses on creating the required ambience for education which has resulted in a reduced ratio of drop-outs at elementary level. It has almost covered 72 blocks of 54 districts in 12 states and one Union Territory, where the ST population is 25% or more and ST female literacy rate is below 35%. It also aims at facilitating 100% enrolment of tribal girls in the identified districts or blocks, more particularly in naxal affected areas and in areas inhabited by Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs).

With increasing literacy ratio this proves as a win-win situation for the education department and the country as a whole. Further the minister said that the government had released Rs 1,943.59 crore to 27 states in the last 5 years to set up Eklavya Model Residential Schools. Along with this, about 10.3 million adult non-literates belonging to ST communities had been certified as literates under "Basic Literacy Assessment Test", on March 7, 2018.

According to the census data, due to enhanced awareness about girl education, ST female literacy rate increased from 34.8% in 2001 to 49.4% in 2011.