Education to Become a Fundamental Right in India

June 18th, 2011 by admin No comments »

It is heartening to note that education is to become a Fundamental Right in India for the children between the age group of 6 and 14 living in India. Recently the Indian cabinet took a unanimous decision to that effect. The decision will have far reaching consequences in the Indian society.

Hitherto education has been in the category of Directive Principles of State Policy and one of the welfare measures to be taken by the Indian Government to achieve the Welfare State Ideal. However, it was not a right but only an ideal to be achieved. Hence, a child who has no opportunity for education could not claim it as a matter of right in a court of law. In other words, by the inclusion of education as the directive principles of state policy, it was not justiciable, which means a child cannot go to court pleading that he or she has no opportunity for education.

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India’s Move to Right to Education

June 18th, 2011 by admin No comments »

BACKGROUND.

It was Saturday afternoon; the world seemed to be on vacation but me, as I was busy serving guests at a lunch party at my masters’ residence. Chatting and laughing was loud enough to be heard in every nook and corner of the house. But those were of least concern to me, because I had to respond to every single call for any requirement at the very word of the guests or the master in particular. It was 2009, and I was just seven, wearing a sweater and a half pant, watching a bunch of people boasting about the achievements of their wards and trying to prove ones child better than the other. When suddenly, an old man read from a magazine that the government was to pass a new act namely, Right to Education Act. But to me those routine talks about the household work made more sense than this new coming up topic, because neither I could read or understand there high-level conversation, which had diverted there talks from their children, on top of that I didn’t even understand, what the word ‘right’ meant. That elderly fellow said something like…

History of the Act:

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