No schools for slum children in India's capital
Three surveys conducted recently in the national capital of India have found that nearly quarter of a million children living in slums do not go to schools. The findings have also highlighted the problems of unemployment, poor health and lack of civic facilities among the city’s slum dwellers.
New Delhi: In a city of 1.38 lakh millionaires about 2.42 lakh children don’t go to schools, a survey of 25 lakh people living in Delhi’s slums has found.
This means about 71% of Delhi children go to school as against the national average of 94.5% and 100% in states like Tamil Nadu.
Terming the revelation a “telling figure on the state of children in Delhi”, Amodh Kanth, chairperson of Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights (DCPCR), said: “The city has failed to implement alternative modes of education to bring children who are not enrolled under the education mode.”
The survey, conducted by the Samajik Suvidha Sangam Society under the aegis of the Delhi government also found that 25.4% of the slum population, considered the most vulnerable section, was illiterate, the highest for any city in the country. As high as 92.3% of them did not have a bank account.
The educational disparity between the rich and the poor was highlighted by another finding of the survey of 12,000 households in slum clusters. Only 4.7% of them were graduates, 7.9% had passed Class XII, about 20% had completed elementary education and 15.2% primary education.
“About one million children come from poor and vulnerable backgrounds and their basic rights and needs are not fulfilled despite the availability of several government schemes,” Kanth said.
About 83.3% of this group were found to be Hindus, 14.3% Muslims and 1.4% Sikh.
Among the Hindus, Scheduled Castes constituted over 30%, Other Backward Classes 14.1% and the Scheduled Tribes 7.8%.
Despite the Capital attracting over five lakh people every year from other states, over 10% of the respondents were unemployed. Another 9% pulled rickshaws, picked rags and ran small shops. “There are about 35,597 rag pickers in Delhi, the majority of whom are children,” Kanth said.
Surprisingly, about 90,000 government servants also resided in the slums, the survey found. Only 3% reported suffering from ailments like cancer, tuberculosis and heart disease while 97% did not know if they suffered from any disease.
On the brighter side, the survey conducted by St Stephens Hospital for the society found that 67.4% had their own homes with less than 1% being homeless.
The survey, conducted just before the Delhi assembly polls, also found over 51% of those living in slums had a regular water connection. As many as 96.6% had installed an electric meter, indicating privatisation of power has helped in checking theft.
