Drastic cut in budgetary allocation for stipends to cause dropouts

A drastic cut in the budget allocation for stipends in primary, secondary and higher education would cause dropouts in rural Bangladesh, especially in haor, char and coastal areas, according to a child budget analysis.

The analysis showed that budgetary allocation for stipends has been reduced by 73 per cent in the current fiscal 2017-18.

The budget analysis was disseminated at a seminar titled 'Child Budget 2017-18: Towards the Realisation of Child Rights in Bangladesh' organised by Save the Children at the CIRDAP auditorium in the city on Thursday..

State Minister for Finance and Planning MA Mannan addressed the programme as the chief guest, Finance Division secretary Mohammad Muslim Chowdhury as the special guest with Save the Children director (child rights governance & child protection) Laila Khondkar in the chair.

Presenting the keynote paper Save the Children deputy director Ashiq Iqbal said despite achieving nearly 100 per cent enrolment and gender parity in primary education, around 5.5 million children still drop out of such education.

In terms of child health, 63 per cent of the children are born outside of health facilities though the country has exceeded Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) target of reducing child mortality.

Bangladesh has significant performance in lessening poverty but still 26 million children are living below the poverty line, he said.

Mentioning that education budget has been reduced in the fiscal 2017-18, Mr Iqbal said current budget allocation for education is 12.6 per cent while the last year's budget was 14.4 per cent.

Stipend for primary education in the fiscal year 2016-17 was Tk 14 billion which is reduced to Tk 3.5 billion in the current fiscal; at the same time, secondary education stipend lessened to Tk 1.1 billion from Tk 2.4 billion and higher secondary stipend came down to Tk 0.5 billion from 1.5 billion.

He said the government needs to increase health and education budgets by 20 per cent and 25 per cent respectively to remain on track in achieving Sustainable Development Goal-3 (health) and SDG 4 (education).

Delivering the chief guest's speech, Mr Mannan said the government has taken special initiatives for the children living in disadvantaged areas of the country like haor, char, coastal belt, tea garden and poverty-stricken districts.

He also said the government has launched midday meal programme for school- going children in 22 upazilas which will be increased considerably in near future.

Speaking on the occasion, finance division secretary said budget allocation in many sectors has seemed dropping in the current fiscal but it hasn't actually been reduced rather increased.

He said budget allocation for pension schemes for retired officials of different ministries was distributed through respective ministries till last fiscal, but from the current fiscal it is being distributed by the finance ministry.

The shift of budget allocation from different ministries to one has actually shown the downtrend in budget, Mr Chowdhury added.

Talking about reduction in the stipend programme in the education sector, he said, "The stipend was given under a project which has come to the end recently, but the government has taken a fresh initiative to reintroduce the project with much more increased budget."

A budget proposal of Tk 69.23 billion for stipends will be placed before the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) shortly while the stipend budget was Tk 34 billion in the past, he added.

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