The government has revealed some fascinating facts about the funds utilised in the education sector.
According to the Ministry of Education, out of Rs 93,224 crore rupees allocated for education in last year’s Budget, only approximately Rs 56,567 crore have been utilised so far.
The government also revealed that in 2021-22 the unspent balance (as of January 11) of central universities and centrally funded higher education institutes stood at Rs 7,143 crore, which is significant when compared to previous years of Rs 274 crore in 2020-21 and Rs 355 crore in 2019-20.
A detailed break-up of Budget allocations and expenditure related to the Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA), IMPRESS (funding to promote social science research), and IMPRINT (funding for research in premier institutions), as well as University Grants Commission (UGC) grants for research, show consistent under-utilisation of funds.
The Ministry of Education said that in 2020-21, only Rs 165 crore out of Rs 300 crore allotted for RUSA could be spent. In 2019-20, Rs 2,100 crore was allocated, and Rs 1,277 crore was used.
In 2021-22, Rs 3,000 crore was allotted. The figure has now been revised to Rs 793.26 crore. RUSA is a centrally sponsored scheme to provide funding to state higher and technical institutions.
The government response showed that the grants released by the UGC under minor and major research projects (science and humanities) have also been falling.
It has constantly reduced from Rs 42.70 crore in 2016-17 to Rs 38.60 crore in 2017-18 to Rs 13.26 crore in 2018-19 to Rs 5.75 crore in 2019-20 to merely Rs 38 lakh in 2020-21.
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