DIAGNÓSTICO

The story of the origin of REI sits at the intersection of several factors and tendencies among which are – a) India and the provincial government’s (government of the state of Rajasthan) commitment to achieve the goal of UEE, b) history of educational reforms and programmes such as Lok Jumbish and Shiksha Karmi in Rajasthan that were supported by international donor agencies,13 c) the aspiration of the state government to be part of the global economy (Box 4.1), d) scope and intentions of involvement of private sector via PPPs at national level (Box 4.2) as well as state level,14 and e) an emerging trend of international and transnational networks affecting policy and agendas across the globe.

13

Education Guarantee Scheme, Alternative Schooling, District Primary Education Programme, Lok Jumbish, Shiksha Karmi and in 2001 the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, at the Central as well as State level, supported by bilateral and multilateral agencies such as World Bank, DFID, and EC.

14

Rajasthan also launched a social viability gap funding scheme for involvement of private sector in organising social services such as health and education through construction of infrastructure. The Annual Plan of Rajasthan 2004-2005 had a chapter on voluntary sector where it discusses setting up of an Association for Rural Advancement through Voluntary

The launch of the REI in 2005 is an interesting example for understanding the role, power and influence of political leadership in introducing (or facilitating the introduction of) a new programme in their constituency while also being part of a global alliance to effect change. ‘Education responsive to a competitive global society’ as the vision document indicates was being aimed for through REI by a government facing resource scarcity (Box 4.3).

The Chief Minister of Rajasthan, Vasundhara Raje Scindia attended the WEF Meeting in Davos in January 2005, where she was impressed by the success of the Jordan Education Initiative (JEI) and expressed interest in launching an initiative modelled on MSPs (GoR, n.d.a, p. 14). This led to consultations with the business leaders15 at the WEF following which the REI partnership description and vision document was signed by its core partners at the India Economic Summit in November 2005 (GoR, n.d.a; interviews with PMU, 2008).

15

The REI documents do not specify which business leader and other participants were consulted

Box 4.2 Scope and Intentions of Involvement of Private Sector via Public Private Partnerships

The national and regional policy on PPP: In India the eleventh five year plan (2007- 2012) for development lays specific emphasis on the role of public private partnerships. The role of private sector in infrastructure development and role of NGOs in community mobilisation is envisaged for the development of education. The national policy on voluntary sector which formed part of the eleventh plan also focused on collaborations with the voluntary sector to achieve

“…innovative solutions to poverty, deprivation, discrimination and exclusion, through means such as awareness raising, social mobilization, service delivery, training, research, and advocacy. The voluntary sector has been serving as an effective non-political link between the people and the Government. This policy recognizes the important role that the voluntary sector has to play in various areas and affirms the growing need for collaboration … at the local, provincial and national levels” (GoI 2007, p.1).

As seen in the above excerpt (Box 4.3) the GoR had articulated the education needs of Rajasthan as challenges e.g. implementation of RtE in a specific time frame, need to reduce the gender gap and improving learning competencies. However, there was a contradiction in the resource scarcity arguments in the REI documents and the Chief Minister’s address at the REI planning meeting in August 2005 where she said that ‘there is unprecedented financial commitment from the central government’ for education in Rajasthan and that REI was to serve as an umbrella for all the efforts towards UEE (Scindia, 2005). It is not clear if the state government is resource scarce even in face of an unprecedented financial commitment from the central government. Moreover, could a small scale programme realistically serve as an umbrella for fulfilling the commitments of a nation-wide programme in terms of matching financial commitments and scope?

The REI partnerships were formalised by signing of MoU16 documents between the state government and the partners. Some of the MoUs reflected clear description of deliverables by both the parties, plans and resources while others were vague.17

Box 4.3 Resource Scarcity and REI Section II: The Concept of REI:

Education Responsive to a Competitive Global Society

Efforts made thus far while yielding encouraging results, are still required to be strengthened. Challenges facing the State today are complex: they include (a) legislation for compulsory education to children of 6-14 years, hitherto a part of Directive Principles, is now a fundamental right, making it incumbent on the state to achieve results in a specific time frame; (b) reducing gender gap in education, especially amongst tribal and other disadvantaged sections of society, a chronic problem which has now to be addressed in a focussed manner; (c) improving learning competencies of children; (d) empowering education for preparing the students for a competitive global society; and (e) above all, facing the challenge of resource constraints. The task for a Government alive to its responsibility in a parliamentary democracy is formidable, particularly when it is in the midst of resource scarcity. (GoR, n.d.a, p.13)

Prior to this launch, representatives of the Rajasthan state government (including the Minister of Education, Ghanshyam Tiwari and Principal Secretary Education, C K Mathew) attended the India Roundtable on ICT Empowered Education in Dublin (May 13 – 15, 2005) and a month later attended the 5th Jordan Education Initiative Update Meeting in Amman (June 17 – 18, 2005). Later that year two REI planning meetings were held (August 1 – 2 and October 16 – 17) in Rajasthan, India. Rajasthan’s Chief Minister presented a review of REI at Davos in January 2006 and the first update meeting of REI partnerships was held in Rajasthan in April 21 – 22, 2006. The speedy launch of this programme (see Box. 4.4), once an idea is adopted by the top leadership, is indicative of the ‘soft power’ of these international alliances in influencing the power elite and the power of the elite to initiate change. However, whether the state machinery is ready and capable of taking on the responsibility which such programmes demand from the platform, is an important determinant of the benefits accrued. This is a subject I will return to when discussing the impact of different aspects of the REI.

17

See appendix to Chapter 4 for list of MoUs signed and appendix to Chapter 9 for summary of the MoUs of the eight programmes discussed in this thesis.

Box 4.4 A Brief Timeline of REI

January 2005: Vasundhara Raje, Chief Minister, Rajasthan attended the meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos 2005

November 2005 a: World Summit on Information Society, Tunis, November 16-18, 2005

November 2005 b: REI launched in India with signing of the partnership description by Principal Secretary, Education, Government of Rajasthan, Peter Torreele, Managing Director, World Economic Forum (WEF), Stephan Nolan, Executive Director, Global e-Schools and Communities Initiative (GeSCI), N. Srinivasan, Director General, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) on November 29, 2005 during the World Economic Forum India Summit in New Delhi.

January 2006: Chief Minister’s Review Presentation at Davos

April 2006: The REI’s first update meeting was held on April 21-22, 2006 in Jaipur, Rajasthan, India.

The following chart (Fig.4.1) depicts the REI Organogram. It reveals important issues regarding the governance of REI. There appears to be top down and uni-directional relationship of the REI Governing Committee (GC) with the Programme Steering Committee (PSC) as well as the REI-Programme Management Unit (PMU) (Fig. 4.2). These two committees were constituted on October 19, 2006 vide office order F.No.6 (63)AR/Gr.3/2006. The relationship between i) PMU, ii) the MoU partners and iii) District Level executive committees (the Trio) seems more interactive/intercommunicative from the figure but was it really so on the ground? The REI partners reported that where the MoUs were signed directly at the district level, there were gaps in communication with the PMU and district level committees causing delays in partnership implementation. Moreover, till the end of 2009 there had been no meeting of GC and only one meeting of PSC was held on October 10, 2007.

The partners also reported that their relationships with the government officials Fig 4.1 REI Organogram

with the officials. The PMU was relatively a stable structure because of its cadre of Deputy Directors (DDs), in-charge of programmes but the head of the PMU i.e., the SSA Commissioner/Director and the Deputy Manager of the PMU (Officer on Special Duty i.e., OSD,REI) were frequently transferred. Also the relationship of the REI’s international partners with the PMU and their role is not explicit. It seems that they had no relationship with the REI-PMU and therefore any claims that they were to make unilaterally about the success or failure of REI comes into question.