Jammu and Kashmir Education Minister Naeem Akhtar said on Saturday that the coalition government is determined about course correction in education and the creation of a knowledge-based society in the state."Knowledge-wise, J&K has historically been the source of knowledge and enlightenment in South Asia. The first Buddhist conference was held in Kashmir in the 4th century, this place was known as Sharda Peeth (seat of knowledge)," Akhtar said.
"Even up to contemporary times, iconic people like Krishna Joo Razdan, Shiv Kumar Sharma, K.L. Sehgal and Mallika Pukhraj were born here. In not very distant past, Lal Ded and Sheikh Nuruddin Wali were born. Wali set up the first girls school in Kashmir during times when girl literacy was unheard of in South Asia.""Today our literacy rate in J&K has dropped to 6th rank in the country. The vision is to achieve 100 percent literacy level among females," Akhtar told a media conference on Saturday in winter capital Jammu.
Akhtar said the present education system in the state is "a juggernaut which is either focused on employment or creation of infrastructure and the least spoken about in the present educational system of the state is the child".The minister said there are at present 24,265 schools with 16.68 lakh students and 1.43 lakh teaching staff."This means in physical terms the state education department is half of the entire state government. And yet, the passout percentage of government schools is 50% which is 25% less than that of private schools. In the Jammu province during the last five years, just four students have figured in the top 20 in the 10th class exams," Akhtar said.
The minister said the most difficult problem for the department has been postings and transfers of teachers."It is not fully verified, but I have been told that there has been a racket in transfers and postings and the racket goes right up to the exam centre where bids were held at astronomical rates to manage exams", he said.The minister said all this will have to change. "We will ensure transparency, accountability and efficiency. I will make government schools competitive and attractive so that people send their children to these schools and not pay exorbitant rates at places where education had been reduced to a lucrative business," Akhtar said.He also said that relocation of teachers to places where their services are gainfully utilised, postings of teacher couples together at convenient places where they can deliver and incentives like laptops to middle school headmasters are just the beginning to make the turnaround possible.