The Telugu Desam Party Telangana State unit has demanded that the government take steps to release funds for effective implementation of the literacy programmes in the State with immediate effect.
The government should take steps to enhance salaries of village coordinators to ₹ 10,000 a month against ₹ 2,000 being paid at present and the coordinators at the mandal level to ₹ 30,000 against ₹ 6,000 of the present. Steps should be taken to regularise the services of Sakshara Bharat coordinators and efforts should be made to extend the coordinators system to the newly constituted districts, TDP-TS working president A. Revanth Reddy said.
In a letter addressed to Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, Mr. Revanth Reddy criticised the Government for not intensifying efforts to promote literacy levels in the State. In spite of the Chief Minister’s assurance on making Telangana the frontrunner in terms of literacy, no steps had been initiated in more than three years to promote literacy on a campaign mode. As a result, the State was ranked a poor 32nd among the 29 States and seven union territories across the country in terms of literacy rate.
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Though there was exclusive departments functioning for promoting literacy levels with thousands of staff working, the Government’s negligence in addressing their issues had resulted in the present situation. Literacy levels in Telangana which remained backward in terms of education levels in the erstwhile united Andhra Pradesh remained the same even after the new State was formed.
According to studies conducted by the Centre, literacy levels in 309 out of the 584 mandals was at 55 per cent while the situation was much worse in 167 mandals. The situation comes in the light of the TRS Government’s announcement that efforts would be stepped up to achieve literacy rate of 95 per cent.