With few takers, govt schools losing ground to pvt ones

Hubballi: As many as 148 government schools in Karnataka were “temporarily” shut down in the last two years due to a shortage of students. Ironically, 44 private primary and high schools started functioning within five km of the very government schools that were shut down during this period.

According to the education department’s data, in the 2022-23 academic year, 11 Kannada medium private schools and 18 English medium schools started operating within a five km radius of the closed government schools, whereas in 2023-24 one Kannada medium school and 14 English medium schools were opened by private managements in areas where government schools could not attract a minimum of 10 students to operate the schools.

Right to Education Act  says there should be one primary school within a km of human habitation, a high school within a three-km range, and one pre-university college within a five-km radius of human habitation. In 2023-24, Karnataka had 75,869 schools with 1.19 crore students who were taught by 4.33 lakh teachers.

Documents also show that the state government did not open a single government primary school between 2022 and 2024, whereas 584 private primary schools (62 Kannada medium; 522 English medium) started functioning in the state.

The state government, however, opened 69 Kannada medium high schools in these two years. In contrast, of the 373 private high schools that started functioning between 2022 and 2024, only 35 were Kannada medium and 338 were English medium.

Education activist V P Niranjanaradhya says over the last three decades, successive governments have neglected public schools. “How can private schools, which are driven by market and profit margins, flourish in areas where government schools are not able to attract minimum students? As long as political leaders, who run private schools, are at the helm of affairs, government schools cannot become a source of learning for weaker sections of society.”

In the private sector, 227 primary schools (95 Kannada; 132 English medium) and 66 high schools (47 Kannada; 19 English medium) have closed down. Thirty-five private PU colleges have closed down in the last two years.

Rishikesh B S, faculty, Azim Premji University, Bengaluru says given that education is a fundamental right, the government cannot escape from its duties of providing quality education by saying that they cannot sustain schools with low admissions. “Governments are duty bound to continue schools or make alternative arrangements to ensure that students have safe access to schools. Each school should be looked at case-by-case and solutions should be found to ensure every child attends school,” he said.

A senior education department official, requesting anonymity, said on record that the government has not shut down even a single government school. “As and when these schools start receiving admissions, we will reopen the schools.”

He said not just government schools, even private schools are shutting their doors due to lack of students.