Civil society calls for movement to save public education in Telangana

Hyderabad: The Telangana Save Education Committee, a collective of social activists, student unions, political parties, professors, and teachers’ unions has resolved to continue its struggle against the state government, to press for sweeping reforms in the education sector, as promised by Congress in its election manifesto before coming to power.

The committee held a protest at Dharna Chowk on Friday, June 27, against the state government’s order removing teachers from primary schools in the state with less than 60 students enrolled in them. The activists claimed that 1,980 schools could risk being shut down.

“It should not be about how many students are enrolled in a school. The government should see how many children are in a village, and should create facilities and infrastructure to cater to them. There are 69 lakh students in the state. The government should develop the school infrastructure for all of them by establishing a common education system,” demanded retired professor Lakshminarayana.

Reminding that the Congress, which came to power by promising 15 percent of the budget allocation for public education, he said it was shameful on the part of the government to forget its promises.

Professor G Haragopal said that presently the country was experiencing a dangerous ideological combination of feudalism and imperialism, which breeds hatred and talks about benefiting only the corporate giants.

Citing the killing of Socrates, the repression at Harvard and the University of California, he spoke about how education and the questioning voices have always been a threat to fascism and dictatorship.

Commenting on senior RSS leader Dattatreya Hosabale’s statement on the need to review the words ‘secular’ and ‘socialist’ in the preamble of the Constitution, Haragopal said these kinds of comments showed the direction where the BJP and RSS wanted to take the country.

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“When Telangana was formed, the first budget was presented with Rs 1,81,000 crore. I told KCR that history will record his governance, as the only history Telangana had was till 1956, and from 2014, when he became the chief minister. It was a great opportunity to overhaul the education system. But they have failed in doing so,” Haragopal said.

He also cautioned the Congress government that what it has been doing was wrong, especially in the education sector.

“One of the promises made by the Congress in its manifesto was restoring democracy. But as soon as they came to power, they put conditions for holding meetings at Sundarayya Vignana Kendram (SVK),” he pointed out.

Haragopal said it was time to fight the economic system, which has been destroying education.

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