City’s annual per child cost highest in country

Naina Mishra

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, December 5

Chandigarh has the highest annual per child cost at Rs 28,176 among all states and union territories in the country.

The annual per child cost of the city is even higher than Delhi as for the primary level, it is Rs 28,008, whereas for the upper primary level, it is Rs 28,108.

Explaining the reason for high per child cost, Former Education Secretary BL Sharma, who retired recently, said, “This implies that we give best facilities in government schools, including infrastructure. Our mid-day meal and sports infrastructure are also of best quality. You have to spend money to become best. This is why our per child cost is high.”

So far, only 17 states/ UTs have notified per child cost for reimbursement to private schools against admission of children belonging to disadvantaged groups and weaker section under Section 12(1)(C) of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, 2009, as per the Annual Work Plan and Budget 2019-20.

After Chandigarh and Delhi, Tripura has the third highest annual per child expenditure at Rs 21,138. On the contrary, Uttar Pradesh has the annual per child expenditure as low as Rs 5,400, implying only Rs 450 per month cost of a child in the state. Bihar and Himachal, too have low per child cost at Rs 6,569 and Rs. 2,895.35, respectively.

Rates not revised timely

Chandigarh officially notified reimbursement rates, which were pending since 2015, in August this year. The latest per child per month cost notified by the UT is Rs 2,348 (monthly) for the 2017-18 session. The rates for the 2018-19 and 2019-2020 sessions are yet to be notified.

The Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) had sanctioned a total amount of Rs 20.73 lakh to Chandigarh for reimbursement of Rs 1,370 per child per month in 2014-15.

Chandigarh had proposed Rs 180.924 lakh for reimbursement. However, due to the delay in notification of reimbursement rates by the UT Finance Department, no amount was sanctioned by the Centre during the 2019-2020 session.

What is per child expenditure?

• The RTE Act under Section 12 (2) provides for reimbursement of expenditure to schools providing free and compulsory elementary education as specified in Clause (c) of sub-section (l) of Section 12.
• The total expenditure incurred by the appropriate government from its own funds and funds provided by the Centre and by any other authority on elementary education in respect of all government schools must be divided by the total number of children enrolled in all such schools to arrive at per child expenditure incurred by the appropriate government.
• The schools are reimbursed expenditure incurred by them to the extent of per-child expenditure incurred by the state, or the actual amount charged from the child; whichever is less, in such manner as may be prescribed.