Solutions In IR

National Perspective- India

A solution to helping solve the issue of lack of education in India, is that the
government immediately invest more money towards education, as they are
currently only investing a mere 3.1% of the GDP towards the ministry of
education. Due to this, schools lack funds, and state governments often lack the
funds to hire permanent teachers.
Even though the GDP has increased a whopping five times, since 2005, the
educational budget more or less remains the same.

In 1964, the Kothari commission recommended increasing the education budget

from 2.9% to 6%, even though it's been five decades, there is little change.
Even in NEP 2020, it was stated the budget should be raised to 6% of total GDP.
The USA spends 5% of GDP on education, and the median public education
budget was 4.4%. India, as the country with the world’s highest population, since
it has more citizens to educate, should obviously be spending more on education
than other nations, as they can clearly afford to.

Doing this would have a profound effect on families who are unable to afford
schooling, as the government would be able to have more schools established.
They may even be able to remove the small fee if they increase the education
budget that comes with studying in a government school.

This would help children have a quality education with proper infrastructure,
teachers, etc.
The government should establish these schools all over India, to increase access
to education in all regions.

In Jan 2021, the Gov of India, and the world bank signed a $500 million to improve
education in six Indian states, which include Himanchal, Odisha, and Kerela. This,
is almost of half of what India spends on education yearly, which is about 105
billion.

While definitely helping to improve the state of education in these states, it needs
to be implemented all over the country to increase literacy rates and help the
overall struggling population, as 6 states is not even ¼ of total Indian land area.
However, this deal does make it easier for the government to spend more money
on each individual state/region, as the number of states reduces.

The solution implementation could take about six-eight months, as the budget
making process usually begins in August- September, and takes about six
months to lay out a full plan, gain approval and insure that other areas aren’t
being to negatively impacted

The person in charge of preparing the budget is the Finance Minister, in the
Ministry of Finance, in the budget division of the Department of economic affairs.
with the addition of a number of advisors. The minister seeks the views of the
industry captains and economists as well.

There won’t be any additional resources required during the budget making
process, just what the four stages the government always undergoes during the
budget making, and to cut some funding from other areas such as infrastructure
to support education. They will need to review other areas and decide which
would be the least impacted.

They can also mandate bigger businesses and corporations chip in building
schools and education centers, despite protests.

While these resources will have a major impact on bridging the education gap,
the government will need to reduce the budget of another area to implement this.
As a result, it may not be possible to increase the budget of education too much,
as other areas may be negatively impacted.

This won’t charge the government any additional cost than they usually spend on
the nation, as the GDP won’t change. However it may be difficult when
considering the impact of cutting cost on a specific area, to decide whether the
negative impact is worth it, or how much and where the public can help, or where
exactly its best to cut cost from.

However, while it may not charge the government any additional cost, it may
charge the public, as the remaining budget for that particular area may not be
sufficient to fulfill the needs of the nation, which may result in extra taxes.

The steps required to implement this would be for the government to first realize
teh true impact of education and that there needs to be a change. Then, the
finance department would need to decide, with the industry captain and finacers
views, of where to cut costs and consider the range of impact, and then finally,
present it and gain approval or make the necessary changes.

This solution will benefit the struggling population a lot as they will finally have
much easier and more cost convenient access to education for children, and, as
education reduces unemployment, will also reduce poverty rates in the future, as
more people will have a stable source of income.

However, this may also lead to less employment opportunities for the overall
population, but, in the future, job opportunities will also increase, due to
advancing technology, so that will probably also help hinder the impact.

However, the budget of another area will have to be reduced in order to facilitate
this change in increasing the education budget of the country, which might lead
to the public having to contribute to areas like infrastructure, sustainability etc, or
slightly increased taxes.

This is because after cutting costs from a particular area, the remaining budget
for that area may not be enough to meet the needs of the population/nation,
which would require more money and additional funding from the population.

Credits-
https://www.thequint.com/opinion/indias-education-budget-can-the-govt-make-investmen
ts-in-edtech-a-priority#read-more

https://www.livemint.com/budget/news/budget-2023-how-is-union-budget-prepared-from-i
nitial-meetings-to-president-s-approval-all-steps-explained-11674115966563.html#:~:text=
The%20budget%2Dmaking%20process%20begins%20in%20August%2DSeptember%2C%
20almost,involves%20a%20number%20of%20steps.

https://www.indiainfoline.com/knowledge-center/union-budget/understanding-the-budget
-process#:~:text=The%20budget%20is%20prepared%20by,in%20their%20opinions%20an
d%20suggestions%20.

https://byjus.com/current-affairs/government-budgeting/#:~:text=Components%20of%20
Government%20Budget&text=Capital%20Receipts%3A%20All%20the%20incoming,come
%20under%20the%20Capital%20Expenditure.

https://gem-report-2019.unesco.org/chapter/finance/#:~:text=Globally%2C%20median%20
public%20education%20expenditure,Latin%20America%20and%20the%20Caribbean.