Budget 2023: Allocation for education up by 8.3%

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman also announced a national digital library, for which states will be asked to set up physical libraries with infrastructure at the panchayat and ward levels.
Chikmagalur school
Chikmagalur school
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The Union government has allocated Rs 1,12,899 crore for the education sector in the Union Budget for the financial year 2023-24. This is the highest budget allocation for the education sector so far. It indicates an increase by Rs 8,621 crore (or 8.27%) from last year’s allocation. Of this amount, Rs 68,804.85 crore has been allocated to the Department of School Education and Literacy, and Rs 44,094.62 crore to the Department of Higher Education.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman also made several other announcements related to the education sector in her Budget 2023 speech on Wednesday, February 1, including a National Digital Library for children and adolescents.

Although the Kothari Commission in 1965 and subsequent national education policies have consistently recommended that India must spend around 6% of the GDP on education, the expenditure has consistently remained much lower, hovering around 3% of the GDP in recent years. According to the Economic Survey presented by Nirmala Sitharaman on Tuesday, the expenditure on education as a percentage of GDP was 2.9% continuously for three years, in 2020-21,  in 2021-22 (as per the revised estimate) and in 2022-23 (as per the budget estimate).

Some of the other announcements related to education made during Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s Budget 2023 speech are :

> A National Digital Library for children and adolescents to be set up with books “across geographies, languages, genres and levels,” and with “device agnostic accessibility.” To make the digital library accessible, states will be encouraged to set up physical libraries at the panchayat and ward levels with required infrastructure.

> To compensate for the learning loss during the COVID-19 pandemic, sources such as the National Book Trust, Children’s Book Trust and others will be asked to provide non-curricular books in regional languages and English to these physical libraries. The initiative will also involve collaboration with NGOs. Financial sector organisations will be encouraged to provide age-appropriate reading material for financial literacy at these libraries.

> Over the next three years, the Union government will recruit 38,800 teachers and support staff for the 740 Eklavya Model Residential Schools, serving 3.5 lakh tribal students.

> Teachers’ training will be re-envisioned through innovative pedagogy, curriculum transaction, continuous professional development, dipstick surveys, and ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) implementation. The District Institutes of Education and Training (DIETs) will be developed as “vibrant institutes of excellence,” for this purpose.

> A total of 157 new nursing colleges will be established near the existing 157 medical colleges established since 2014.

> Three centres of excellence for Artificial Intelligence will be set up in top educational institutions. Leading industry players will partner in conducting interdisciplinary research, develop cutting-edge applications and scalable problem solutions in the areas of agriculture, health, and sustainable cities. This will galvanise an effective AI ecosystem and nurture quality human resources in the field, said the FM.

> A total of 100 labs will be set up for developing applications using 5G services in engineering institutions, “to realise a new range of opportunities, business models, and employment potential”. The labs will facilitate work on applications such as smart classrooms, precision farming, intelligent transport systems, and health care applications.

>  Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY), the flagship initiative of the Union Ministry of Skill Development & Entrepreneurship, will be relaunched as PMKVY 4.0. The FM has also announced setting up of 30 Skill India International Centres across states. The scheme will cover new age courses for Industry 4.0 like coding, AI, robotics, mechatronics, IOT, 3D printing, drones, and soft skills.

In last year’s Union budget, Rs 1,04,278 crore was allocated for education. However, this budgeted estimate was later revised to Rs 99,881 crore. The Department of School Education and Literacy was allocated Rs 63,449.37 crore (Budget Estimate), which was revised to Rs 59,052.78 crore (Revised Estimate). The Department of Higher Education was allocated Rs 40,828.35 crore, which was not revised. For the National Education Mission (Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan) for school education, an amount of Rs 38,953.47 crore has been allocated this year, down from Rs 39,553.31 crore allocated last year, which was later revised to Rs 32,612.33 crore (Revised Estimate). 

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