Speaking to mediapersons at the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan building on Nrupathunga Road, the minister said education was the very much the priority of the government and it would take all possible measures to promote it.

“Nobody should question our intentions as we have run tent schools and mobile schools but where is the logic behind running a school where there are zero to five children,” asked the minister.

He said that there are 150 schools in the State without students while there is sizeable number of schools with five students.

He said there are numerous challenges to run schools with very few children like teachers not being enthusiastic to impart education and children lacking the spirit of competition.

He, however, admitted that there are loopholes in the education system due to which people prefer sending children to private institutions and to rectify these flaws, government has initiated measures to give more training to the teachers and attract children to the government schools as well. He said the success of government schools lay with the people too.

The minister said despite all odds, 85 per cent of the school children study in government schools.

The government in the last ten years has spent Rs, 6,500 crore on Sarva Shiksha
Abhiyaan, the minister said.

Education Day

Kageri said that National Education Day would be celebrated at the Shikshakara Sadan in Bangalore on Friday to mark the birth anniversary of the first education minister of the country Moulana Abul Kalam Azad.

He said last month the Union Minister for Human Resources Kapil Sibal had convened a meeting of all the education ministers from all the states asking them to celebrate the day, a mark of tribute to Moulana Azad.

Kageri said the Right to Education has now come into force and the government is doing all efforts to strictly implement this scheme in the State to provide quality education to the children belonging to economically and socially backward sections.

As part of it, the government had launched ‘Shaalegagi Naavu-Neevu’ (You and we for school) programme in July this year. He said public participation is necessary to make the event successful.