Improve infrastructure in govt. establishments: Dalit body

Improving the infrastructure in government-run instructional establishments, growing post-matric scholarships and revitalising college students’ unions in universities and schools had been among the key recommendations despatched to the Chief Minister by Dalit Intellectual Collective on the interventions wanted to boost the standard of colleges and better schooling in the State.

Addressing the media on Wednesday, C. Lakshmanan, a college on the Madras Institute of Development Studies and convener of the collective, stated many government-run establishments, significantly the Adi Dravidar and Tribal Welfare colleges and hostels, lacked primary infrastructure, together with bogs and water.

Highlighting that the post-matric scholarship quantity given to college students had not been revised for 10 years, the collective stated it should be doubled and periodically revised in accordance with adjustments in the Consumer Price Index.

Mr. Lakshmanan stated whereas one of many key suggestions of the Thorat Committee, shaped years in the past to review discrimination in instructional campuses, was to strengthen college students’ unions, nearly all State-run universities and schools didn’t have sturdy pupil our bodies.

Suggestions of the collective included the structure of Pandithar Iyothee Thaasar and Periyar Chairs in increased schooling establishments for interdisciplinary research on social transformation.

The collective highlighted that though the general Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in Tamil Nadu was excessive, it was comparatively a lot lesser for Scheduled Caste (SC) and Schedule Tribe (ST) college students.

“Since the 1% reservation for ST students is implemented at the department-level in institutions, they lose out on opportunities since the total number of seats is often much lesser than 100, and therefore, not a single seat gets allocated to them. The government should either apply the reservation at the institution-level or ensure that at least one seat goes to an ST student in each department,” Mr. Lakshmanan stated.

The collective additionally demanded the formation of a State-level committee to revise the syllabus for increased schooling establishments, because it has not been performed in many establishments for years.

Other recommendations included the extension of breakfast and mid-day meal scheme to increased schooling establishments, fellowship programmes for college students to do analysis overseas, and visiting grants for lecturers of schools and universities to go to overseas universities.