The study prepared by Institute of Applied Manpower Research (IAMR) under the Planning Commission sought to capture the educational disparity of different districts across six states through an index and observed that Coimbatore and Madurai of Tamil Nadu have better track records at primary and upper primary levels.

The study undertaken by Dr Anil K Yadav, Chief of Social Concerns Studies Unit, IAMR, has picked up two districts each from Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, MP, Rajasthan, UP and West Bengal to show glaring disparities in access to education, infrastructure facilities, availability of teachers and overall human resource development. While Dharwad and Hassan from Karnataka have recorded better performance in infrastructure and teachers, both the districts have lagged behind even the backward areas of MP and Rajasthan when access to education at primary and upper primary levels are taken into account.

Four indicators

The study has given scores or index values to each district in each of the four indicators - access, infrastructure, teachers and outcome.

The outcome indicator takes into account the overall Gross Enrolment Ratio and also the enrolment of SC/ST students and drop out rates.

The access indicator has taken into consideration the percentage of habitation not served and the number of schools per 1,000 population.

Judging through these yardsticks, the index value of Hassan in the “access” category at primary level is 0.222, only better than Baghpat in UP (0.130) and Kooch Bihar in West Bengal (0.216).

Even backward districts in MP like Betul and Dhar have better scores with 0.611 and 0.725 respectively. Dharwad with an index value of 0.403 provides better access to primary schools than Hassan, but still far behind not-so-developed districts like Gorakhpur (0.516) in UP.

The scene changes a bit at the upper primary level with Hassan improving its scores at 0.500, but Dharwad recording a poor 0.327. However, Dharwad has topped the list in terms of availability of teachers with an index value of 0.874 with Hassan following it with 0.793.

Infrastructure

In infrastructure, which takes into account average student-classroom ratio, percentage of schools with drinking water facility, separate toilets for girls among others, Dharwad has scored an impressive 0.668 and Hassan 0.471 at primary level.

But both the districts have performed better at upper primary level with Hassan securing the third position.