Union Budget 2022: Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to present Fourth Budget today

The education sector is expecting Budgetary allocation to be 6% of GDP

Union Minister of Finance Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting Union Budget 2022 at 11 am today, February 1, 2022. Sitharaman will be presenting her fourth budget presentation this year. The education sector is upbeat about this year’s Budget and is expecting it to take conducive steps to bridge the digital divide gap.

The FM Nirmala Sitharaman will be presenting a paperless budget this year as well, she had carried a Made in India tablet to present her budget last year, amid the COVID-19 pandemic. In her Budget 2021, she allocated Rs 93,224.31 crore to Education Ministry, down by over Rs 6,000 crore from the 2020-21 budget estimates. Department of School Education and Literacy was allocated Rs 54,874 crore, accounting for 59% of the Ministry’s total allocation. While the department of higher education’s budget dropped by Rs 1,116.52 crore to Rs 38,350 crore.

The education sector is expecting Budget 2022 to take conducive steps to bridge the digital divide gap so that learning solutions can be easily accessed by everyone as it’s a critical need at the ground level. There is the demand to digitally connect all schools in the country and also ensure a smooth glitch-free working of the digital infra post its implementation.

Some of the experts are of the view that the Union Budget 2022 should increase budgetary allocation for education, as allocation in India is less compared to other developed countries. Since the National Policy on Education in 1968 recommended the spending on Education to be 6% of GDP, the National Education Policy, 2020 (NEP) also stresses increasing public investment in education to 6% of GDP. In Budget 2021-22, the allocation for education was 2.67% of the central government’s estimated expenditure for 2021-22.

Over 200 million children lost a complete year of formal education due to the lack of proper digital infrastructure and unequipped teachers as Schools were shut across the country. Online education needed a dynamic digital infrastructure but due to lack of funds, the schools could not impart education. Education should reach each corner and the remotest of areas of India. The pandemic showed a mirror that we need to have a robust and improved digital infrastructure to reduce the digital divide of rural and urban.

Read more: 

• Economic Survey 2021-22: Education Expenditure allocation rises by 20%
• Budget Session 2022: President lauds inclusion of girls in Sainik Schools, NEP, Education in local languages