Deprived Education for Children living in Urban Poverty
(Deprivation
& Slum, Migrant and Streets Children)
Neelam Patel
General Secretary
Pragati Path Foundation
Abstract
The
existences of slums are prevalent not only in India but throughout the world in
other countries also such as China, Japan, Korea and so forth. The main
objective of this research paper is to focus upon the educational opportunities
available for the slum’s children in India. What is their lifestyle and how
does acquiring of education influence their living.
The main
areas that have been emphasized upon in this research paper are existence of
slum areas and population, problems faced by the slum’s children in achieving
elementary education, understanding of significance of education by the slum’s
children, objectives to endorse education amongst the slum’s children and
factors affecting the demand and supply of education amongst the slum’s
children. Slum areas in India are in a very underdeveloped and a deprived
state, the people who reside in slum areas, in other words who are slum’s
children are stated to be the most underprivileged, deprived and weaker
sections of the population; they are isolated from the other sections of the
population and the community. Some of the individuals residing in slum areas
are sometimes fortunate to acquire a job of a domestic helper or a construction
worker or a labourer so that they can make money and earn a living. On the
other hand, slum’s children are mostly not aware of the meaning and
significance of education, therefore, this paper would focus upon the education
of the slum’s children.
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At the same time, since the
1980s, it has become progressively clearer that the de facto privatization of
education, reflected in the growing number of private schools, has become
well-known in a large number of states, including the educationally backward
states. On the other hand, ‘Education for All’ is still in progress, since just
about 17% of children aged between five to fourteen years have dropped out from
school, and 36% of the total populations of India were illiterate in the year
2004-05. This overall picture of education in India implies that educational
opportunities and accomplishment for the urban deprived are much lower than for
the wealthy and prosperous sections of the population. There have been less
educational opportunities available amongst the slum’s children of the country
and they live in the conditions of poverty and backwardness.
Existence of
slum areas and population: Slums are a worldwide occurrence and are
present in almost all cities throughout the world. The disadvantaged children
and the adults residing in the slums are denied of various necessary facilities
and services that the other children and adults take pleasure in, those who
reside in non-slum areas, hence the slum children need special attention. As
per 2011 Census report in India approximately 1.37 crore households or 17.4% of
urban households reside in slums, in Kolkata it was estimated to be 29.6%. Education
plays a crucial part in placing an appropriate basis for the overall
socio-economic development of any area. Right of Children to Free and
Compulsory Education Act 2009 provides children the right to free and
compulsory admission, attendance and completion of elementary education.
Urbanization accompanied by the sustained growth in the population due to large
scale migration leads to expansion of slum’s children. In India, almost one in
every six urban households resides in slums. Over a third of India’s slum
population resides in its 46 million plus cities. Of the four metro cities,
Mumbai has the maximum proportion of slum dwelling households (41.3%) followed
by Kolkata, which is 29.6% and Chennai which is 28.5 %. Delhi, the capital of
India has 14.6% of its households residing in slums. Among all million plus
cities Vishakhapatnam has the highest population of slum’s children that is
44.1%. Decadal growth over the period of 2001-11 shows that population has
increased by more than 181 million, percentage of growth is 17.64, literacy has
increased from 64.83% to 74.04% and slum population has increased from 75.26
million to 93.06 million.
It is crucial to center upon the
slum population for the following three reasons. Firstly, insufficient access
to safe drinking water and sanitation in slum areas can influence the benefit
of residing in urban areas, thereby making slum’s children an underprivileged
group. Secondly, the population growth rate in slums is greater than in other
urban locations. Thirdly, among the Millennium Development Goals, the one that
unambiguously centers upon urban areas is goal number seven, that is to ensure
environmental sustainability of which objective number eleven signifies that by
the year 2020 an important development and enhancement in the lives of at least
100 million slum’s children should be achieved. The main problems of
poverty, illiteracy, unemployment and ill-health prove to be the major
hindrances of the developing countries on the whole, and India in particular.
Problems faced
by the slum children in achieving elementary education: Among various dilemmas experienced by
the slum children belonging to six-fourteen years age group in attaining
elementary education, the most important factors are large family size, unfortunate
living conditions, deprived health, adverse house situation, and nearby
environment, relocation, language problem, unbalanced occupation and economic
condition, poor parental educational background and school setting. A large
family size leads to higher dependency ratio. In a family consisting of a
father, mother and three or four children of school going age where father is
the only earning member, then it becomes difficult for him to send all the
children to school. Getting employed in an unorganized sector with reduced and
unsound income and where all other family members are economically dependent on
him then in such a case, it becomes difficult to meet all the requirements of
the family members and household. In such kind of a situation the ability of
providing quality education to their children or even assisting them to
maintain their studies gets influenced. The higher the number of children
within the family, the lower becomes the percentage of children not being
admitted or dropped out of school.
Majority of the families that account for
98.75% were found to dwell in a small single dark, humid, room without proper
ventilation and electricity provisions which serves them for multi-purpose
activities that is, living, dining, sleeping, storing, bathing, washing,
cleaning, cooking and so forth. In slum areas, one single room is often used to
hold all the family members and their varied day to day activities. A serene
and calm environmental condition for focusing on the studies and reading at home
is almost absent. The entire surrounding environment is usually found to be
polluted, muddy, unhealthy and susceptible to various diseases like malaria,
jaundice, dysentery, tuberculosis, asthma, respiratory infection and so on.
Understanding
the significance of education by the slum’s children: Education in the present world has
become a crucial area, for not only the wealthy people but they also carry
significance for the slum’s children. As it has been stated above slum’s
children encounter number of barriers and problems during the course of
acquiring education. Construction of houses, buildings is common in all
countries and cities, in India, when construction of a house takes place, the
laborers come from their villages with their young children, and in cities
normally there are schools nearby where education is provided to
underprivileged children without charging the tuition fee. The laborers and
other workers who are engaged in minority jobs send their children to schools
so that they can learn the basic concepts. In the past, education and literacy
was not considered important for the disadvantaged groups living in slum areas,
the adult people are in most cases not educated, they are not able to read and
write; they are mostly engaged in manual and minority jobs such as construction
workers, domestic helpers, rag pickers, cleaners and so forth. They did not
believe in acquiring education and held the viewpoint that they are supposed to
work to earn their living and perform the household chores.
In the present existence, even the slum’s
children have realized that education is vital for their enhancement and
overall development, even though they have not acquired literacy skills, they
are willing to send their children to schools so that they are able to acquire
education. The people residing in slum areas have limited income, they have
normally larger families with three to five children and they have to meet the
requirements of all family members, therefore, they send their children to
schools where they do not have to pay the fees such as anganwadis, and other
schools where fees is not charged and education is provided free of cost.
District Primary Education
Program (DPEP): The District Primary Education Program (DPEP), launched in
1994, is assisted by the World Bank, European Commission, and Department for
International Development (DEFID) of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and
the United International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF)
Non-Formal Education (NFE) and
EGS & AIE: The scheme of non-formal education (NFE), introduced in 1977-78
on a pilot basis and expanded in subsequent years, focused on out-of school
children in the 6-14 age group who have remained outside the formal system due
to socioeconomic and cultural reasons. The scheme was initially limited to ten
educationally backward states covering urban slums, hilly, tribal and desert
areas. The scheme has many lacunae-lack of enthusiasm of teachers, poor quality
of training, ambiguity in curriculum and text-books, lack of community
participation, weak management system, insufficient outlay, a lack of emphasis
on mainstreaming etc. Moreover, most NFE centers were in habitations already
served by formal schools.
DISCUSSION In India, in urban
areas people who migrate from rural areas in search for better job
opportunities, employment and look forward to have a better standard of living
are homeless, they do not have proper shelter or they reside in slum areas
under underprivileged and backward conditions and living standards. Throughout
the country, there is a significant percentage of population that resides in
slums. In slum areas, there are many kinds of problems that contribute to
making the living standards hopeless and despondent. There is absence of clean
drinking water, electricity, people have large families, there are mostly three
to five children in a family and all the family members reside in just one
single dark room and carry out all the household chores in a single room
including washing, bathing, cooking and so forth. The male member of the family
in some cases is able to find a minority job such as a laborer or a domestic
helper, these are low paying jobs, therefore this kind of a situation puts him
under pressure to look after all the needs and requirements of his family.
Earlier the slum’s children did not understand the meaning and significance of
education, but with the initiation of Right of Children to Free and Compulsory
Education Act 2009 that provides all the children the right to free and
compulsory admission, attendance and completion of elementary education and
their residing in urban areas has made them realize the significance and
meaning of education. There are schools that provide primary, upper primary
education for the children particularly belonging to socio-economic backward
sections of the society free of cost; the slum’s children also have developed
this viewpoint that they would send their children to schools so that they can
at least acquire the basic literacy skills of reading, writing and arithmetic.
The backward living conditions of the slum’s children and absence of basic
facilities and civic amenities have proved to be the major barriers and
problems in their acquisition of education but strong determination, hard work
and dedication is required on the part of the parents as well as their children
to attain education and be able to read and write effectively. The slum
conditions need to be improved and developed, children often get admitted into
the school, but when they face problems and difficulties they even drop out,
which may prove to be a barrier during the course of their development, hence
it is vital to improve the living standards of the slum’s children so that they
can effectively acquire education and look for better job opportunities.
By Neelam Patel
A paper submitted to
National Seminar on Education Deprived Sections:
Problem and Solution
May 6th-7th, 2017
Organize by
Department of Education
Mahatma Gandhi Kashi
Vidyapith, Varanasi
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