Cabinet nod ends policy of no-detention for Class 5, 8

New Delhi, Aug. 2: The Union Cabinet on Wednesday approved the scrapping of the nodetention policy in schools till Class 8, while giving states the option of conducting a retest for students who fail in the year-end annual exam.

Under the present provision of the RTE Act, students are promoted automatically to higher classes till Class 8.

This is one of the key components of the RTE Act which came into force on April 1, 2010.

Now, an enabling provision will be made in the Right of Children forFree and Compulsory Education Amendment Bill which will allow states to detain students in class 5 and class 8 if they fail in the year-end exam.

However, the students will have to be given a

second chance to improve via an examination before they are detained.

The bill will now be placed in Parliament for approval.

The Cabinet also gave its nod to the human resource development ministry’s plan of creating 20 world-class higher education institutions.

The UGC had in February passed a new set of regulations to set up 10 world-class institutions in the public sector and as many in the private sector.

Of the 20 universities, the 10 state-supported institutions are expected to receive public funding of up to `500 crore each.

An Expenditure Finance Committee note seeking `5,000 crore for these institutions was also moved in the Cabinet meeting.

The HRD’s separate rules — UGC (Declaration of Government Educational Institutions as World Class Institutions) Guidelines — allow these institutes to fix their own fees for foreign students and decide salaries for foreign faculty.