Union Minister Prakash Javadekar, in a reply to a query during Question Hour in the Lok Sabha on Mon-day, said that India’s online education surpassed many countries amid the Covid-19 crisis and covered all students across the country.
In his response to the question whether the government has set any guidelines and standard for online education in the country and what kind of mechanism has been devised to ensure that online education abides by the guidelines and standards set by the government, he said our online education system covered students right from class 5 to higher education, after physical activities were barred in schools and colleges due to the Covid imposed lockdown.
“Underprivileged students were also covered” in the online education system for which the government ran 34 educational channels — 22 for higher education and 12 for school education, he added.
Besides this, a programme named ‘Diksha’ has also been implemented through which the government managed to ready millions of lectures.
“Nobody was deprived of education in India despite the Covid-19 pandemic. Education reached everyone without any advertisement,” Javadekar said.
When asked whether the government is going to re-start schools anytime soon, the minister said many states have taken initiative and started schools.
“The education reached everywhere, practically there is no gap now,” he said, adding people who did not even have access to TV, were provided access to mohalla schools.
On the outlay for digital education in the Budget, he said it was an evolving budget, “therefore no fixed amount was given.” But over Rs 600 crore have been incurred as expenditure on digital education from the government’s side, he said.
“I can assure that there will be no dearth of money for this initiative of the Modi- government.” he added.
The minister spoke on the issue amid the din created by the Opposition seeking withdrawal of the three contentious farm laws.
The Congress, DMK, Shiromani Akali Dal, Shiv Sena and other parties trooped near the Speaker’s podium raising slogans against the government after the Question Hour started, soon after the Lower House assembled for the day at 4 p.m.
Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla later adjourned the House till 5 p.m. after Javadekar’s reply. Earlier, the Speaker tried to convince the members to go back to their seats and maintain the dignity of their post by supporting the proceedings of the House.