In his speech in the Budget session of the West Bengal Assembly, the Governor praised the Trinamool Congress government for the “holistic development of minorities” — especially in the education sector.
However, a recent report co-produced by Nobel laureate Amartya Sen’s Pratichi Institute with other organisations, said “the general education of Muslims faces multifaceted challenges” in the State. According to the report, West Bengal’s Muslim community — 27.01 per cent of State’s population — is doing increasingly well in sending the girl child to school but the community is behind the State’s average in literacy. While the State’s average is 76.3 per cent of the population, the Muslim literacy rate (MLR) is 69.5. Moreover, in districts where the community is in a majority or near majority, the rate is even lower than the MLR. Districts like Uttar Dinajpur, Malda and Murshidabad — with an average of 56 per cent Muslim population — have 51.6, 58.1 and 63.2 per cent literacy rate respectively.
The 368-page report, co-produced with Association SNAP and Guidance Guild, shows that blocks with higher concentration of Muslims have lower number of schools. Blocks with over 50 per cent Muslim population (65 of 341 blocks are Muslim majority) have 4.6 “government-managed” primary schools for every 10,000 of its population, while the State’s average is 6.2. Blocks with less than 15 per cent Muslims have 7.7 “government-managed” primary schools, which is considerably higher than the State’s average. Such discrepancies can also be observed when the schools are not managed by the government.
Fewer teachersThese central districts of the State — Uttar Dinajpur, Malda, Murshidabad — where the TMC’s poll performance has been at its worst, also record fewer combined secondary and higher secondary schools than the State’s average. While for each lakh of population the State average is 10.6 schools, in Uttar Dinajpur, Malda and Murshidabad the figures are 6.2, 8.5 and 7.2 respectively. Blocks with larger proportion of Muslims also have fewer teachers, the report says.
These districts also have fewer colleges . “To take an example,” the report says, “a college in Kolkata may be expected to serve a population of 11,000 aged between 19 and 29” which is much lower compared to the State average of 38,000. However, for districts with a higher Muslim percentage, “this number is at least 56,000 per college” and in Uttar Dinajpur a college serves a college-going population of 76,000.
Despite factors such as distance from home, “monetary problems” or “loss of [household] income” that result in lower enrolment or higher drop out rate among the minorities, the girls, at the primary level perform better than boys.
The Census 2011 figure shows that the gender gap — as in male literacy to female literacy — is considerably less among Muslims in Bengal than the overall rate. While 81.7 per cent of men are literate in Bengal compared 70.5 women, among Muslims it is 72.5 (male) to 64.8 (female). Thus, if in the overall population the gender gap is 11.2, then it is 7.7 among the Muslims, according to 2011 Census. The survey sets it at a lower rate of 4.8 and thus concludes that it “defies generally ideas about the religious orthodoxy about the Muslim families.”
The survey underscores the importance and success of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan for the community’s achievement.
Published - February 29, 2016 02:33 am IST
