Mysore, Ashwini Y S, Nov 20, 2013, DHNS: There are 8,281 school dropouts in Mysore district as per recently concluded Out of School Children (OOSC) survey, carried out by Sarva Shikha Abhiyan (SSA), as opposed to 2,506 dropouts, as furnished by the Education Department in its 2010-11 survey.
This not only brings to fore the discrepancy in the figures given out by the department, but also proves correct the argument laid out by activists, who have all along claimed that the number of school dropouts are much higher than what it is made out to be.
The activists had contended that there are 6.28 lakh school dropouts in the State (based on District Information Education System - DISE statistics), while the education department had pegged the numbers at only 51,944. Taking note of the arguments placed forward by the activists, the High Court had given directions to address the discrepancies in the two figures, and also reduce the dropouts to zero.
As per DISE figures, there are around 8,000 school dropouts in Mysore district.
However, the 2010 survey by the department indicated that there were only 2,506 dropouts, out of whom 1,575 dropouts had been brought to the mainstream between 2011 and 2013 — leaving 931 dropouts to be addressed.
However, the recently concluded survey paints an entirely different picture, putting the department in an embarrassing position. There are 7,751 dropouts, and 531 children who have never been enrolled to schools, bringing the total to 8,281 children who are out of schools.
“We are now forced to concede to the fact that the activists were right all along. The numbers coincide with the figures projected by the activists. We now have to devise different strategies to bring these many children back to school,” said SSA Deputy Project Co-ordinator Chandra Patil.
Patil also said this time around, the figures corroborated were “accurate”, as the survey was conducted in two phases. The first stage – ‘School Survey’ involved identification of students who were enrolled last year and gone missing this year. Attendance and transfer certificates formed the basis of this survey, which was conducted on November 6 and 7.
The second stage was ‘Household/door-to-door survey’ where a team of officials from departments including Education, Women and Child Development, Health and Family Welfare, Labour, RDPR and members of NGOs, are said to have visited around 5.19 lakh households in the district between November 13 and 17.
CIVIC Bangalore Executive Trustee Kathyayini Chamaraj, who is a petitioner in the court, said the latest survey conducted by the government was not “sufficient”. “I have appealed before the court and also the authorities that conducting the survey should not be first priority. The government has to first put in place procedures, and focus on capacity building, which involves training the designated authorities, giving them a role, and making them responsible. The survey can be adopted towards the end in a phased manner. Each child identified has to be given a unique ID, following which a reliable data base can be built.”
She highlighted that the present survey carried out did not guarantee the fact that all children have been covered. “What about those children who are involved in hazardous occupations, or employed in shops and establishments? This survey has not taken into consideration street children, or even those children who are involved in cattle or sheep grazing. What about these children? Also, the department is just giving out statistics pertaining to last year. This excludes information about children who dropped out seven or eight years ago. Without this data, we will not be in a position to identify all those children who have dropped out between the ages six and 14,” she said, adding that the 8,281 seemed like an unlikely number for the total number of school dropouts in the district.
