Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan: Objectives, Functions & Benefits & UPSC Notes

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan is a vital government flagship scheme that aims to universalise elementary education. It aims to provide free and compulsory education to all children in the age group 6-14 years in a time-bound manner.

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan is one of the most important topics for the UPSC IAS exam. It covers a significant part of Social Justice in the General Studies Paper-2 syllabus. This article will provide an overview of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and its main objectives, aims, functions, features, and importance for the UPSC exam. Join the UPSC coaching today and boost your preparation. 

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What is Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan?

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) is a significant education initiative, initiated by the Government of India in 2001. Its primary objective is to offer free and obligatory elementary instruction to the entire population of children between the ages of 6 and 14. The initiative concentrates on enhancing the school infrastructure, increasing the number of students, decreasing the dropout levels, and advancing the educational level. SSA focuses on children belonging to special need groups, such as girls, SC/ST, and other young people belonging to disadvantaged groups. It promotes both community engagement and local education planning. SSA is a precursor to the Right to Education (RTE) Act, which gave the right to basic education in India.

Main objectives of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan

SSA comprehensively implements its goals after enacting the Education Rights Act, 2010. The goals aim to positively influence curriculum, teacher education, planning, and management. The large aims of SSA are stated as follows:

• To establish new schools in such habitations that lack schooling facilities.
• To build on the current school infrastructure.
• To offer alternative schooling facilities.
• To build new schools.
• To have additional classrooms, toilets and drinking water facilities in the schools.
• To continue the school improvement grants.
• To offer the children free textbooks and even uniforms.
• More teachers are available in such schools to boost the power of the teachers in the schools where a lack of teachers exists.
• The improvement and expansion of the capacity and capability of the current existing teachers of the schools by:
• Extensive Training
• The development of learning materials retains the learners' learning.
• Academic support structure is getting empowered at the cluster, block and district levels.
• To impart quality education to the students and also give them life skills.
• To facilitate education in girls (to transform the status of women, being the broader objective) and also the education of anybody with special needs or differently-abled.
• Further, the Ministry of Human Resources and Development also states that SSA desires to extend equal opportunity in education to the children of individuals who are part of:
• SC
• ST
• Muslim Minority
• Landless Agricultural Labourers, etc.
• To identify the learning requirements of traditionally excluded groups
• SSA is also the one that aims to bridge the digital divide by providing computer education to the children
• Significant points of concentration in the case of Universalization of Elementary Education (UEE) are:
• universal access
• universal enrolment
• universal retention
• accessible, good-quality elementary education to every child
• Before the year 2010, the time-bound objectives of SSA were:
• By 2007, all children must be enrolled in at least five years of elementary schooling
• By 2010, all children had eight years of education behind them
• Close the gender and social category disparity at the primary schooling level by 2007 and the elementary education level by 2010.

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Functions of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan

SSA approaches the fulfilment of its goals holistically following the signing of the Right To Education Act of 2010. The goals will aim to positively influence curriculum, teacher training, educational planning, and management. The primary roles of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan are:

• Ensuring social justice by providing basic education to the children.
• To respond to the demand for improving the standards of education.
• To make the environment conducive and accessible for attaining basic education.
• Increase India's literacy level by universalising elementary education.
• Capacity building among the teachers can be achieved by imparting new intensive training to them and keeping them up to date with the latest teaching materials and teaching aids.

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Beneficiaries of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan

• Children aged 06-14 will receive free education, uniforms, and textbooks.
• Upgradation of existing infrastructure in schools by instituting regular grants to them.
• The teachers will be equipped with the resources needed to improve pedagogy.

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Achievement of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan

The success story of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan is that it has provided free and compulsory education to children of the age group 6 to 14 years in the entire India, and it has also reduced the dropout ratio and enhanced literacy.

• There is considerable improvement in the total enrolment in elementary schools from 18.79 crores in 2009-10 to 19.67 crores in 2015-16.
• PTR (Pupil teacher Ratio) has improved to 25 in 2015-16 from 32 in 2009-10.
• UDISE- GER, Gross Enrolment Ratio) is 99.21% for the primary level and 92.81% for the upper primary level.
• Out-of-school students consistently dropped from 134.6 lakh in 2005 to 81 lakh in 2009 and 60.64 lakh in 2015.
• The Gender Parity Index (GPI) has reached 0.93 for the primary and 0.95 for the upper primary level.

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Recent initiatives under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan is trying to incorporate digital learning, inclusive education of children with special needs and better teacher training to help improve overall education standards. Some of the new programs under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan are as follows:

Padhe Bharat Badhe Bharat

This program was launched in 2014 to improve the reading and writing skills of Class I and Class II children. It aims to help the children understand the joys of reading and writing from a real-life perspective.

Shagun Portal

To track the developments of SSA, it was introduced in 2017.

Shaala - Siddhi

School Standard Evaluation Programme (Shaala - Siddhi) is a programme that helps in attaining the objectives of SSA.

Swachh Vidyalaya

• National Campaign: Clean India: Clean Schools
• Goal: To ensure that every school in India has a set of operational and well-maintained water, sanitation and hygiene-related facilities.

Sakshat

This program was launched in 2017 to address the issue of out-of-school children. It provides a variety of interventions to bring these children back to school. 

Samagra Shiksha

This program was launched in 2018 to consolidate the various education schemes under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan. It aims to provide holistic education to children from early childhood to secondary level.

Digital Shiksha

This program was launched in 2020 to provide digital learning solutions to children. It provides access to online courses, e-books, and other digital resources.

Rashtriya Aavishkar Abhiyan

This program was launched in 2021 to promote innovation and entrepreneurship among school children. It provides a platform for children to showcase their innovative ideas and projects.

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Limitations of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan

The limitations of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan include uneven quality of education, inadequate infrastructure, teacher shortages, and regional disparities in implementation across rural and urban areas.

• Despite providing free education, textbooks, and uniforms, parents in many parts of India, especially in remote areas, are reluctant to send their children to school.
• Even though the government may provide free education, some auxiliary expenses still exist that many parents from the poor social class cannot bear. Therefore, they refrain from sending their children to school.
• As per ASER, a report published by NGO Pratham, 78% of the students of class III and 50% of class IV are unable to read the text of class II.
• A critical shortage of 6,89,000 teachers is needed to achieve the pupil-teacher ratio per the RTE norms.
• Poor accountability in SSA leads to low attendance and inadequate learning.
• Despite the high dropout rate, 1.4 million students drop out between 6 and 11 years old.

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Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and District Primary Education Programme (DPEP)

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and District Primary Education Programme (DPEP) are key government initiatives aimed at universalising primary education, with SSA expanding and building upon the foundation laid by DPEP.

• DPEP was a centrally-sponsored scheme that was launched in 1994 to revitalise the education system at the primary level.
• The central government bears 85% of the project cost, and the state government pays 15%.
• DPEP was the first program to achieve universalisation in elementary education.
• In DPEP, the district was treated as a unit for planning and extended to 18 states.
• The central government was assisted externally by international organisations like the World Bank, UNICEF, etc.

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Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan – Universalisation of Elementary Education

The various Constitutional, national, and legal policies and statements that backed the cause of UEE are:

• Constitutional mandate of 1950: The state shall strive to enact free and mandatory education to every child up to 14 years of age under the Right to Education. The 86th Constitutional Amendment Act of 2002 made this a Fundamental Right.
• National Policy of Education,1986: This policy also aimed at quality education for children up to the age of 14 years, along with their retention in school.
• Supreme Court: It also upheld the right of every child in the country to have free education till they attain 14 years of age in the Unnikrishnan Case,1993.

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Convergence of Different Ministries & Schemes

The convergence of the different ministries is necessary for efficient resource utilisation and achieving SSA's objectives. Programs/Schemes of other departments/ministries identified for convergence with SSA are:

• Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD)
  • Facilitate age-appropriate admissions.
  • All eligible schools have a Mid-Day meal scheme.
  • National School of Open Schooling.
• Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoH&FW)
  • The government hospitals, Primary Health centres, or Referral hospitals will conduct regular health check-ups in schools.
  • Ensure delivery of services to Model Cluster School.
• Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment and Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoSJ&E and MOTA) 
  • Funds will be converged to build school residential facilities for students and other required staff.
  • Ministry of Women & Child Development (MWCD) Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) to be strengthened.
  • ICDS to facilitate preschool enrolment and learning.
  • Benefits are to be extended to the students based on ICDS.
• Ministry of Women & Child Development (MWCD)
  • Promote pre-school education and enrolment
  • Ensuring the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) benefits the school kids enrolled in schools.
• State PWDs
  • Offer geo-spatial technologies in school mapping and social mapping exercises at the grassroots level.

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Conclusion 

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) has enabled change in India's education scenario. Being one of the flagship programmes of the Government of India, it sought to realize universal elementary education in a time-bound form. Over time, the SSA has brought considerable improvement in school infrastructure, supply of teachers, enrolment and learning outcomes, especially at the frontiers of marginalised groups like girls, SCs, STs and children with special needs.

The SSA contributed to making education accessible to even the farthest locations of the country because of its encouraging community involvement, inclusive education, and decentralized planning. It made local bodies and parents participate actively in the development of schools. The initiative also provided the background to the Right to Education Act (RTE) 2009, a legal instrument that made free and compulsory education available to all children aged 6 to 14 years in the country.

Although many of its objectives have been realized in the mission, issues like quality of education, retention of students and training of teachers are still relevant. But now that it is part and parcel of the larger Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan, the legacy of SSA still has its positive effects on the education system in India.

Finally, the SSA should be mentioned as not a mere policy but a movement, making education the centerpiece of national development. It gave millions of children a chance to learn, grow and dream, and thus it was a milestone in the process of India achieving equitable and quality education for all.

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