Experts have always accused governments of neglecting education in their annual budget. But the Delhi Government has tried to change that perception.
This year's budget for Delhi has been allotted for education as the Delhi government on Monday presented an annual budget of Rs 46,600 crore for 2016-17 "” an increase of Rs 8,850 crore over last year, with education bagging the lion's share of Rs 10,690 crore, or nearly 23 per cent of the total allocation.
Manish Sisodia (Delhi finance minister and deputy chief minister) said that of the Rs 10,690 crore for education, Rs 4,645 crore has been allocated under the plan head. He further stated that we are increasing budget but the central government has been decreasing the percentage of budget allocation for education every year. State government has constructed 21 new buildings for government schools last year and these would be made functional in July this year.
He elaborated his contribution by saying that they have constructed 8,000 new classrooms, which are equivalent to the infrastructure of 200 schools. If these schools function in double shifts, then they will be equivalent to 400 schools and Rs 100 crore has been allocated for installing CCTV cameras in all the schools. Rs 102 crore has been allocated for training of teachers and Rs 152 crore, and Rs 48 crore for strengthening of sports activities in schools. The Delhi government has also allocated Rs 350 crore for "Swaraj Nidhi", a fund to execute projects selected through mohalla sabhas. Plan is to implement it in all the constituencies.
The planned expenditure of the budget has been pegged at Rs 20,600 crore and non-plan at Rs 26,000 crore. What's astonishing is the fact that about 95 per cent of the budget will be from state government's resources and only five per cent will be provided by the central government. Of the total budget, Rs 36,500 crore will come from the taxes collected. In 2015-16, the budget estimate for the Delhi government was Rs 37,750 crore. It included Rs 21,500 crore non-plan expenditure and Rs 15,350 crore plan expenditure.
Tags: Education In India
Delhi Government
Government Budget
Government Schools
