Dear Mr. Finance Minister, as a PG student of Management there are a few requests that I have to place before you for the forthcoming budget.
Education Loan
For a long time, only professional course students were offered loans by banks. In the last budget you had provided provision for a wider range of courses for which loans can be offered. In principle this should have helped a lot of students take up education, where their family could not afford the fees. However I continue to read in newspapers that many students are not getting their loans sanctioned.
The problem has of course been caused by my some of my unscrupulous seniors who had taken their education loans and never paid back. The previous Finance Ministers as a helpful gesture had waived these loans. The students were happy. However, the brunt of the support for education was felt by the banks. Now banks are hesitant to provide loans to students.
Sir, in this budget, please set an implementable policy so that students, who take a loan for their education, need to pay it back too. This will benefit not only those who have taken the loan but also their juniors in future who will need the loan.
National Knowledge Network
Respected Sir, in the last budget you had made provision for setting up the National Knowledge Network to connect 1500 institutions in the country with fiber optic cables. We hope in this budget you will extend this to all professional colleges. As a trial project the extent of 1500 institutions was adequate. But please consider that in the leading states of the country like Maharashtra, Tamilnadu and Andhra Pradesh, there are over 1500 engineering colleges in each state.
The access to the digital libraries and shared virtual lecture halls envisaged in the National Knowledge Network, will not reach not of the students of the country, if you do not continue to fund this futuristic and most needed project. This project will not only bridge the lack of access to skilled faculty in all colleges, but also create aspiration for teachers to emulate the best in the country, if not the world.
Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan
Sir, we appreciate your understanding that unless the primary Education has high quality, education is not complete. Your support for Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan in the previous budget is appreciable. Please do consider a similar plan for higher education and higher-secondary education. Quality access to such education is not available in rural India today.
National Skill Development Fund
Sir, today in India, we have more engineers than plumbers or carpenters or electricians. Employment opportunities are many. There is a wide spread need for these vocational skills. The National Skills Development Fund was created by you to bridge this gap. The effect of this fund is yet to be seen at our houses. Kindly hasten the implementation of this scheme.
Teacher Training & Career Training
Recently we are seeing a lot of uncultured actions by students and teachers in schools and colleges. We are seeing raging in schools, teachers beating up students and some students stabbing their teachers. All this is because of the blind push to get more marks in exams.
The missing element we believe is because teachers in schools and colleges are not trained properly to handle students and their aspiration. By training the teachers to look at each student as an individual and to support them based on their individual needs and desires, teachers will earn the respect of the students. This requires extensive training for teacher. Please provide a budget for this in the Government expenditure.
The students also need to be exposed to the various career opportunities ahead of them. Currently most of us are blindly going for an engineering degree or a management post-graduation not knowing how our careers are going to be. We also do not understand how such degrees align with our skill sets. Please provide in your budget an allocation for career opportunity training.
Sir, as a student myself, I have placed before you some aspects to we want support and your attention. Kindly take action on those points that you find relevant from your perspective. We appreciate you for your support in the earlier budget for the students’ community. Hope you will continue to support us to create a knowledgeable and powerful India in the near future.