Primary Education Sector of Jammu and Kashmir
The much talked about topic in the state these days is education. From the student protests to the banning of tuition centres, education remains a hot debate in almost every public or private space. However, our focus is on the overall system of education that is in place in the state of Jammu and Kashmir.
We will primarily rely on the government data that is available till date. While going through that data that our team analysed further, we came to the conclusion that the figures are disappointing beyond imagination. In this current issue, we will only deal with the Primary education sector.
Primary Schools
Starting with the government schools, the primary schools show a negative trend in the growth rate between 2015-16 and 2014-15 financial years. As per the official data, there were 14,302 schools in 2014-15, but they were reduced to 14,261 in 2015-16. Forty one schools have either become defunct or were merged with the other nearby schools. Consequently, the growth rate shows a fall of (-) 0.29 percent.
However, the situation is not so disappointing in the Private Recognised Institutions. In the primary sector, schools have gone up from 1,619 in 2014-15 financial year to 1,793 in the next year. The growth rate is a “positive” 9.7 percent.
Teachers
Surprisingly, in the government-owned primary school sector, the growth rate of the number of teachers has had significant increases, showing an upward trend of 28.3 percent. In the year 2014-15, the total number of teachers employed in this sector was 36,372, which surged to 50,751 in 2015-16.
However, the Teacher Pupil Priority Ratio has come down from 21 in 2014-15 to 15 in the succeeding year, showing a disappointing negative growth rate of (-) 40 percent.
The School Pupil Ratio has also gone down by (-) 2 percent approximately, from 53 in 2014-15 to 52 in the following year.
On the other hand, the population of Jammu and Kashmir shows an upward trend. Growing from 13.3 million in 2014 to 13.9 million in 2016, the annual growth rate reflects an increase of 1.50 per cent. These figures reveal a shocking image of the primary education sector of the state: while as the population is increasing rapidly, the number of primary schools is witnessing a negative growth. If the trend continues, this can result not only in a massive shortage of schools for the state but in a falling literacy rate as well.
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