HRD panel wants National Bal Bhavan overhaul

Seema Kaul

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 18

A National Bal Bhavan TV channel, a policy forum on creativity in NITI Aayog to be chaired by the PM, Creative India Programme and an annual Budget of Rs500 crore will be a reality if the recommendations made by a high-powered HRD Ministry panel of experts are implemented soon.

The panel, chaired by former Education Secretary MK Kaw, has recommended that the National Bal Bhavan (NBB) be headed by an additional secretary-ranked officer as Director and it be patterned after the NCERT with the same functional autonomy. The panel, which submitted its recommendations to the HRD Ministry last week, also said the National Bal Bhavan should be renamed the National Creativity Council for Children (NCCC).

Underscoring the staff shortage, inadequate budget, urban bias and haphazard growth of the organisation across the states, the report has recommended immediate steps for reorganisation of the National Bal Bhavan with hosting of district creativity centres by Navodaya Vidyalayas and Kendriya Vidyalaya schools.

Of the 36 states in India, only 28 have Bal Bhavans at present. The NBB was set up in 1956 and at present there are 48 Bal Bhavan Kendras in Delhi. There is no concept of Bal Bhavan at the district level.

The report states that creativity and scientific temper should be a special ingredient of the national curriculum framework and be instilled among children at the ECCE level in the formal school syllabus and the NCCC (with state and district centres) will be the additional input in a non-formal setting.

The committee was set up to consider the recommendations made by the NCERT in 2013, NBB vision document of 2015, a committee chaired by former Cabinet Secretary PK Kaul (report 2001) and examine new suggestions made subsequently to revive and strengthen the Bal Bhavan movement. Danseuse Sonal Mansingh and Chairman of Sangeet Natak Akademi singer Shekhar Sen were the members of the committee set up by Smriti Irani in February 2016. HRD Ministry Deputy Secretary Anamika Singh – who is holding additional charge as Director NBB – was Member Secretary.

Noting that their advice as experts is final, the report concludes with: “The receipt of such a report should not lead to constitution of an empowered committee not should another expert group examine our report. There should be a memorandum for the Cabinet, to elicit the response of the NBB and the Internal Finance. The matter should be debated in the Cabinet and the Cabinet decision should be implemented.”