HRD min rolls out ‘digital boards’ without planning funds

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February 21, 2019

In another, ‘expected’ decision, the government plans to replace all traditional boards with digital boards. They plan to replace seven lakh boards within three years. A noble cause but forgot to allocate any funds.

HRD minister Prakash Javadekar rolled out the scheme to equip five lakh classrooms of the higher secondary and senior secondary schools (classes IX to XII) of the government schools as well as two lakh classrooms of the public-funded higher education institutes.
While the ministry aims to cover nearly 1.5 lakh secondary and senior secondary schools under the scheme by 2022, the university grants commission (UGC) has proposed to cover 300 universities and 10,000 colleges under the scheme in three years, starting from 2019.
India has nearly 15 lakh schools across the country and close to 50,000 higher education institutions. About 10% of the schools and higher education institutions are already equipped with digital boards.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley rolled the scheme in the last budget under ‘Operation Digital Board’ scheme. This scheme requires fund of 7000-10000 crores. The Finance Minister didn’t allocate or planned any funds.

When asked about the funds, Javadekar said not to worry and would soon plan the scheme properly. It is assumed that the funds could be made available for implementation of the ‘operation digital board’ in schools from Rs 36472.40 crore allocated to the school education department on the head of Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA).

The pedagogical improvement is the need of the hour. The problem is that the government again haphazardly revealed the scheme without planning from where these funds will come. This makes the scheme just an inflated bloat of election goodies.

Trending Post Graduate Delivery Boy post shows a horrifying image of Unemployment and Underemployment

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Sugat Srivastava

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February 11, 2019

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A teenager from Kolkata, Shouvik Dutta, ordered food from Zomato. He looked for the details of the delivery-boy and thunder clapped on him. The delivery boy was a post graduate in Commerce. He put up a moving post about a delivery guy. You can read the post from the link below. The issue here is the underemployment and unemployment in India.

Underemployment

Highly-educated Indians looking for lower-skilled jobs is not new. Recently, people with professional qualifications such as M.Tech, B.Tech, and MBA, postgraduates as well as the graduates have applied for posts of sweepers and sanitary workers in the Tamil Nadu Assembly Secretariat. M.Tech students appearing for Junior Engineer posts, graduates working in call-centers, engineers going for Group C & D government jobs, etc. are not rare sights in India. Underemployment is omnipresent in India.

Underemployment arises because of many factors. Partially, the student is also responsible for it. It arises due to the penchant for government jobs, the slump in core jobs, over-flooding with graduates, not enough opportunities in private sectors, etc.

The love for the government job leads to graduates dropping years for preparation. Sometimes, they don’t even consider joining private sector jobs and keep on wasting their time and resources. Automation has decreased core engineering jobs. The market is over-flooded with graduates. This is due to the opening of large numbers of sub-standard universities and colleges. Private sectors, sometimes, act as an infinite loop. They won’t give the job to inexperienced person and vice versa.

Sometimes, the underemployment of highly educated youths leads to the unemployment of lowly and adequately educated people. For eg., M.Tech. students applying and preparing for sub-standard posts like loco-pilot in Railways leads to the reduction in the chances of Diploma holders. Same goes for clerical jobs in banks and in government institutes. In our Prime Minister’s way, selling Pakoda is also a job but a post-graduate pakoda-seller is underemployed. And he might chew away the jobs for the lower educated strata of the society.

What could be done?

Unemployment could be treated by generating jobs and underemployment by creating enough jobs for a suitably qualified person. They should bring a capping system for different government job grades. For eg., for a given group, a person 2 degrees higher than the eligible candidate should not be allowed. A 12th pass job should not allow a post-graduate to apply. The second step could be to generate enough employment to assimilate the graduates and post-graduates. This would definitely solve the problem of underemployment and unemployment both.

BHIM, AYUSH, UDAY policies and NaMo’s Obsession with Acronyms

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Sugat Srivastava

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February 1, 2019

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Narendra Modi led BJP government came to power in 2014. Since then, they have launched schemes which proves the government’s creativity mastery in naming. Gone are the days when insipid acronyms like MGNREGA, RGGVY, RKVY, etc., ruled the ‘policies-naming’ world. The current government is astonishingly obsessed with naming and re-naming.

Snappy and catchy acronyms history doesn’t start from current Modi government. NOIDA (New Okhla Industrial Development Area) was an experiment to attract investors, builders, dwellers, etc. And they succeeded.

The interim budget of 2019 was filled with ‘Modi’s men’ – UDAY, AYUSH, BHIM, etc. Some of the ingenious naming policies by the current government are:

HRIDAY (National Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana)
UDAY (UJWAL Discom Assurance Yojana)
AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation)
UJALA (Unnat Jyoti by Affordable LEDs and Appliances for All)
MUDRA (Micro Unit Development and Refinance Agency)
AYUSH Ministry (Ministry for Ayurveda, Yoga, and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homoeopathy)
BHIM (Bharat Interface for money) App

The polls are near and the government wants the public to remember their works. Naming their policies in a simplified, meaningful and innovative way at least make them easier to remember and recall. Though it is quite immature to say that it would be a decisive factor but it does make their marketing agency to publicize their works.

Government hikes research stipend by 24%, much less than the demanded 80%

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Sugat Srivastava

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January 31, 2019

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The wait is finally over. The months-long protest has finally reaped ‘fruits’. The anticipations of the research scholar community can now sleep in peace. The government has increased their stipend by 24%, which is the least increment in since 2010. Adding salt to the wounds, Department of Science and Technology is also considering to reduce the number of fellowships in the future.

According to the new revision, the Junior Research Fellow (JRF) will get Rs 31,000 and Senior Research Fellow (SRF) will get Rs 35,000 as their monthly stipend which will come to effect from January 2019 onwards. After the last fellowship hike that took place in 2014, a JRF fellow gets Rs 25,000 and SRF fellow gets Rs 28,000 as a monthly stipend. There used to be an unofficial hike in stipend after every 4 years. Among those hikes, this is the least in terms of percentage.

The researchers across the nation united for the cause. 2000 even got arrested while protesting in front of MHRD. They went for hunger strikes, candle marches, etc. Their demand was a hike of at least 80% and payment without delays. Even after the hike, researchers protested in front of MHRD on 30th January. 700 were detained by the police.

The pathetic state of research in India needs no introduction. India spends less than 1 percent of its GDP on research and development. The scientists, each year organize rallies for increasing that figure to 3% of the GDP. But, it is of no use. The Government keeps patting its back over the achievements of ISRO, BARC, IITs, and IISc. But when it comes to funding and supporting them, they vanish in the thin air and announce such ‘chillar’ increment (term used by the researchers to describe the move).

Role of research in any country’s development is crucial. Decades of research on materials and basic science takes the foundation for the new technology. These new technologies make help the countries to progress with their utilization in their respective industries. The Ph.D. degree is the gateway of the academic career and research. They are the future lecturers and researchers. Supporting them means supporting the nation. Many researchers opt to go abroad for research as they know that India is not the ideal place for their talent and brain. The government is just proving their point.

Government Plans to Make All Electricity Meters Smart Prepaid in Three Years

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Sugat Srivastava

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January 29, 2019

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The Government is going to make pre-paid meters compulsory for all households in three years. They would start rolling out pre-paid meters from April 2019. The motive behind this move is to stop illegal connections as well as give the customers relief from month to month bill payment.

This initiative by the Ministry of Power (MoP) is expected to reduce the aggregate technical and commercial (AT&C) losses. This move also aims at improving the financial health of distribution companies (DISCOMs), incentivize energy conservation, and make bill payments hassle-free by becoming digital. Manufacturing of smart prepaid meters will also generate skilled employment for the youth. The cost of the smart meter is too high and the main challenge is to reduce it as soon as possible.

State governments had earlier signed the Power for All document. They have also agreed to supply power round the clock to their consumers. If the company fails to do, they would have to pay the penalty.

Under this, “the distribution licensee shall provide 24×7 power to their consumers by 1st April 2019 or earlier. However the appropriate Commission in exceptional circumstances for the reasons to be recorded in writing may grant extension in this time period,” the statement added.

The motive behind the smart meters is quite appealing. The biggest challenge it faces is that the number of connections hasn’t reached its saturation. It means that electricity is still not available to every household. Moreover, the 24-hours electricity target is still quite distant. The government should also take care of these challenges and work on this technology simultaneously.

Kanhaiya Kumar and others Charged with Sedition despite SC’s Stance

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Sugat Srivastava

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January 14, 2019

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Mocking the constitutional bodies has become a new routine for the government. Even after the Supreme Court’s stance on Sedition, Delhi police filed its charge-sheet against former Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union (JNUSU) president Kanhaiya Kumar and others in a sedition case lodged in 2016.

The police said they have evidence to proceed against former JNU Students’ Union leaders Kanhaiya Kumar, Umar Khalid, Anirban Bhattacharya and seven students from Jammu and Kashmir – Aquib Hussain, Mujeeb Hussain, Muneeb Hussain, Umar Gul, Rayeea Rassol, Bashir Bhat and Basharat.

The police alleged that Kanhaiya incited the crowd and was part of the mob that allegedly raised ‘anti-India’ slogans.

A case was registered on February 11, 2016, under Sections of 124 A (sedition) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC against unknown persons at Vasant Kunj (North) police station following complaints by BJP MP Maheish Girri and the ABVP.

In March 2016, a magistrate report into the event said that anti-India slogans were not raised and stated the videos were doctored to this effect. It is unclear if the police is using the same videos as evidence against the students.

Reacting to the 1,200-page charge sheet, Kanhaiya Kumar said it is “politically motivated”. “If the news is true that a charge sheet has been filed, I would like to thank police and Modi ji. The filing of charge sheet after three years, ahead of elections, clearly shows it to be politically motivated. I trust the judiciary of my country,” the former student leader told news agency ANI.

It may be recollected that on January 10, Assamese leaders and intellectuals Hiren Gohain, Akhil Gogoi and Manjit Mahanta were charged with sedition for opposing the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill. It doesn’t require a scientist to find the pattern and tag them politically motivated. Nowadays, criticizing the government means criticizing the country and it won’t take much time to charge them with treason or sedition or both.

Tag: government

HRD min rolls out ‘digital boards’ without planning funds

Trending Post Graduate Delivery Boy post shows a horrifying image of Unemployment and Underemployment

Underemployment

What could be done?

BHIM, AYUSH, UDAY policies and NaMo’s Obsession with Acronyms

Government hikes research stipend by 24%, much less than the demanded 80%

Government Plans to Make All Electricity Meters Smart Prepaid in Three Years

Kanhaiya Kumar and others Charged with Sedition despite SC’s Stance