The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has approved the proposal of the Ministry of Human Resource Development for the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA). This will facilitate the States / UTs to execute the civil works for construction of new schools as well as expanding capacity in existing schools.
The details are as follows:
(i) State/UT governments will be permitted to use State Schedule of Rates (SSoR) or Central Public Works Department (CPWD) Rate, (whichever is lower) for construction,
(ii) enhancing the funds of Management, Monitoring Evaluation and Research (MMER) from 2.2 percent to 4 percent of the total outlay,
(iii) subsuming other centrally sponsored schemes of secondary education- Information and Communication Technology (ICT) at school, girls hostel, Inclusive Education for Disabled at Secondary Stage (IEDSS) and Vocational Education (VE) in their existing form under the umbrella of RMSA. The pattern of assistance as well as coverage of schools as per their existing norms of all subsumed schemes will continue for the 12th Five Year Plan,
(iv) extending all the benefits of RMSA to aided secondary schools excluding infrastructure support / core areas,
(v) continuation of existing fund sharing pattern of 75:25 for the last four years of the 12th Plan to non North Eastern Region (NER) states and 90:10 for NER States (including Sikkim), and
(vi) authorizing the RMSA Project Approval Board (PAD) of Ministry of Human Resource Development to consider for approval of the integrated plan of the umbrella scheme of RMSA, including the subsumed four centrally sponsored schemes of secondary education and release of funds to the RMSA state implementation society directly.
Out of enhanced MMER of 4 percent, fund up to 3.5 percent of the annual budget allocated for RMSA will be earmarked to the states/UTs for activities undertaken under MMER. In those states and UTs where the proposed percentages of MMER do not meet the requirement, MMER can be enhanced upto 5 percent of the budget allocation of the concerned states/UTs.
Background:
The objective of the scheme is to enhance access and improve quality of education at the secondary stage while ensuring equity.
The umbrella scheme of RMSA will be implemented at state level by RMSA society. Though the broad strategy and the targets of the scheme will not undergo any change, the decision of the Cabinet will provide necessary impetus to the ongoing implementation of the scheme.
States and UTs will execute the construction works smoothly after adoption of SSoR / CPWD rate. Enhancing MMER will provide adequate manpower which will translate into better planning, implementation, monitoring etc.
Inclusion of aided schools will help in providing support to interventions that will improve the quality of education in these schools.
Since inception of the scheme, the RMSA has been able to enhance access to secondary schools by sanctioning setting up of 9,636 new secondary schools, and strengthening of 34,300 existing government secondary schools.
