Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath's government has started to equip schools in the state with modern facilities under the PM SHRI scheme. In the recent budget announcement, an amount of more than Rs 1,000 crores has been fixed for this scheme, as per an official press release,
The budget additionally mentioned there will be assistance from the Centre for this scheme, out of which Rs 510 crore will be spent on basic education and Rs 500 crore will be utilised for secondary education. The state government's move is in line with its vision to provide quality education and create a learning-friendly atmosphere for children, as per a report by ANI.
"According to the standards of this scheme, selected schools will be given the status of PM SHRI and will be equipped with modern facilities. As many as 1,753 schools have been verified by the state government at the district and state levels and the list of those has been sent to the central government," the press release reads.
According to the Director General of School Education, Vijay Kiran Anand, under the PM SHRI scheme, two eligible schools were selected from each block and applications were made from them. After this, these schools were evaluated at the BSA (Basic Siksha Adhikari or primary education) level.
"Schools in rural areas that got more than 60 per cent marks passed and those that got less failed. Similarly, the cutoff in urban was 70 per cent. Only those schools which got marks above this passed. After this, verification of all these schools was done at the state level. Altogether the applications of 1753 schools in Uttar Pradesh have been sent to the Government of India. Of these, 89 schools are of the secondary level while the rest of the schools fall under basic education," the release explains.
With an emphasis on adopting a modern education system to strengthen the foundation of the students in the schools as per the National Education Policy (NEP), the PM SHRI (Pradhan Mantri Schools for Rising India) scheme was launched by the Centre. It was decided that 14,500 schools would be upgraded across India under this scheme, with 60 per cent funding from the Centre. UP received this funding this academic year (2023-24), as per ANI.
