18,694 Elementary Schools Without Teachers !

New Delhi, July 25 (UNI) As many as 13,628 schools in rural areas have no teacher and 1,30,895 have just one each, an executive summary on 11,24,033 elementary schools across India said today.

''A few schools are yet to be provided with a teacher and, on the other hand, a few schools have only one teacher,'' according to the executive summary prepared by National University of Educational Planning and Administration.

The corresponding figures for elementary schools in urban areas: 5,066 schools with no teacher and 6,071 with just a teacher each.

The study suggested that of 4.69 million teachers engaged in teaching in schools imparting elementary education across India in 2005-06, 3.67 million were in rural areas.

The NEUPA study covered 9,80,494 elementary schools in rural areas and 1,43,539 in urban areas in 604 districts across 35 States and Union Territories.

The study circulated by the Human Resource Development Ministry showed that government-managed schools have ''much higher percentage of single-teacher schools-- 14.13 per cent-- compared to private- managed schools-- 2.87 percent.'' Among States, Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Arunachal Pradesh had ''a very high percentage'' of single-teacher schools, 26.17 per cent, 25.70 per cent and 18.08 per cent respectively.

The executive summary did not indicate exactly what or how students do in classrooms without teachers. Queries in the past on such points have yielded little as NEUPA's effort is stated to focus on collecting data.

Retirement and qualifications pose more issues.

As many as 298,000 or 6.37 per cent of the total number of teachers were indicated as likely to retire soon-- 78 per cent of them in rural areas.

Almost 44.54 per cent of male teachers and 46.54 per cent of female teachers are Higher Secondary and below. Some 53 per cent male and 51 per cent female teachers are Graduates or Post Graduates, urban areas having three-fifths of them.

More than half of schools have yet to be provided regular Head Masters. Barely 46.04 per cent schools in rural areas have a Head Master as against 52.65 per cent schools in the urban areas.

One indicator: the percentage of enrolment in single-teacher Primary schools declined significantly during the period from 2002-03 to 2005-06.

The enrolment percentage in single-teacher schools is much lower in urban areas-- 7.37 per cent-- than in rural areas-- 17.47 per cent.

But the study showed equally high enrolment percentage in single-teacher Primary schools in such States as Bihar and Jharkhand irrespective of whether they were under government or private managements.

UNI