The parliamentary standing committee on Social Justice and Empowerment has said in a report tabled in Parliament Monday that the Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA) should adopt a concerted, proactive approach through rigorous monitoring so that construction work of all Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRS) is completed in a given timeframe.
The committee also urged MoTA to finalise the pending locations for 10 out of 15 centres of excellence for sports proposed to be built within the residential schools meant for tribal students.
Regarding the Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utarkash Abhiyan scheme, the committee noted that many line ministries, which are crucial to the scheme’s implementation, have yet to approve it. The Dharti Aaba scheme is targeted towards the saturation implementation of welfare schemes through 17 line ministries.
The committee’s report pertained to the action taken by the Centre on its recommendations in an earlier report on MoTA’s Demand for Grants. “In the action taken reply of the Ministry, the committee finds that the majority of new schools are being run from the rental buildings as only 87 school buildings have been constructed so far,” the committee noted in its report.
BJP MP from Bengaluru Central, P C Mohan, chairs the parliamentary standing committee.
The committee noted that EMRS is very crucial for providing quality education to the tribal students, particularly in remote areas. It added that thus, National Education Society for Tribal Students (NEST), should adopt a more concerted, result oriented and pro-active approach through continuous and rigorous monitoring of all activities related to construction of schools.
In its March report, the House panel had recommended to MoTA that all old EMRS be upgraded in a time-bound manner and new schools sanctioned be made functional in their own building. It had also recommended that requisite funds and necessary guidance should be provided to executing agencies to avoid a shortage of funds for the scheme.
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The residential schools for students belonging to the Scheduled Tribe community were set up from 1988 onwards. Initially, 288 schools were funded through grants under Article 275 (1) of the Constitution. In 2018-19, the Central sector scheme of Eklavya Model Residential School was started to provide quality education at par with Navodaya Vidyalaya to tribal children in their environment.
Under the new scheme, the government decided to establish 440 EMRS, one in every block that has more than 50 per cent of ST population and at least 20,000 tribal persons (as per census 2011). The new target is to set up 728 schools for 3.5 lakh tribal ST students, as per government data.
The government informed the panel that out of 288 schools approved previously, 256 have been completed up till January 17, work was progressing on 23, and 9 were in the pre-construction stage. Out of the 717 locations approved for EMRS, 476 are already functional.
“The proposal for upgradation of 189 old Eklavya Model Residential Schools (EMRSs) has been approved. NESTS is consistently engaging with state governments to make use of this opportunity,” MoTA informed the House panel.
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The committee had said in its March report that out of 452 EMRS sanctioned, 223 are functional, and 211 out of 288 old EMRS have been identified for upgradation. The committee had also noted challenges such as the availability of appropriate land, non-availability of construction material due to state government policy, extreme weather conditions, non-availability of electricity supply, in the construction of EMRS.
