(a) the number of new High Schools and Inter Colleges required to be set up in the
country including Uttar Pradesh as per the norms of the Rashtriya Madhyamik
Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA);
(b) whether the Government has taken any steps for setting up of High Schools and Inter
Colleges in the country including Uttar Pradesh as per the norms of RMSA; and
(c) if so, the details thereof
MINISTER OF HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT
(SHRI RAMESH POKHRIYAL ‘NISHANK’)
(a) to (c): The Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan
(RMSA) was under implementation since 2009 to 2017-18 for universalizing secondary
education in the country. RMSA programme provided a number of incentives to encourage
enrolment and retention of children in schools as well as for improvement of quality of
education. These included enhancing access to secondary schools, strengthening school
infrastructure like school building, additional classrooms, laboratories, libraries, arts & craft
rooms, toilets, drinking water facilities etc.
In current scenario, RMSA scheme along-with Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) and
Teacher Education (TE) have been subsumed under an Integrated Centrally Sponsored
Scheme for School Education-Samagra Shiksha which has been launched from 2018-19. It is
an overarching programme for the school education sector extending from pre-school to class
XII and aims to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education at all levels of school
education.
The Samagra Shiksha aims to achieve universal access of children in schools from
Pre-School to Senior Secondary in an inclusive and equitable manner, focusing on quality of
education with improved infrastructure in the schools. With a view to facilitating States and
UTs, the Scheme provides support to establishment of new schools by up-gradation of Upper
Primary Schools to Secondary Schools and up-gradation of Secondary Schools to Senior
Secondary Schools and, thus, for establishment of composite schools. The scheme also
supports strengthening of infrastructure of existing schools.
The erstwhile RMSA and the existing Samagra Shiksha seek to enhance enrolment at
Secondary and Higher Secondary levels by providing a secondary school and higher
secondary school within a reasonable distance of 5 Km and 7-10 Km, respectively of every
habitation, to improve quality of education by ensuring that all schools conform to prescribed
standard norms and to remove gender, socio-economic and disability barriers. These norms
are indicative for funding under the scheme and the states can prioritize as per their local
requirements.
The Annual Work Plan & Budget (AWP&B) under the erstwhile RMSA and the
existing Samagra Shiksha are prepared by the States and UTs based on their requirements and
priorities under different interventions including the requirement of the new High Schools
and Inter Colleges (Senior Secondary). These plans are then appraised and
approved/estimated in consultation with the States and UTs as per the programmatic and
financial norms of the scheme and availability of budgetary resources.
Since the inception of RMSA in 2009 and Samagra Shiksha in 2018-19, sanction has
been given for opening of 12896 new secondary schools and 44 higher secondary schools,
besides addition of new stream in 851 Senior Secondary Schools. So far, 1486 secondary
schools have been sanctioned to the State of Uttar Pradesh out of which 1478 secondary
schools have become operational. The construction of school infrastructure is carried out as
per Schedule of Rates (SoR) notified by the State Government or Central Public Works
Department (CPWD) rates whichever is lower.
*****