Free and compulsory education to all children up to the age fourteen is constitutional commitment in India. The Parliament of India has recently passed Right to Education Act through which education has become fundamental right of all children of age group 6-14 year.
The National Policy on Education 1986, updated in 1992 envisages paying greater attention to the education of the educationally backward minorities in the interest of equity and social justice. In pursuance of the revised Programme of Action (POA) 1992, two new Centrally-sponsored schemes were launched during 1993-94.
These are,
- Scheme of Area Intensive Programme for Educationally Backward Minorities; and
- Scheme of Financial Assistance for Modernisation of Madarsa Education
Over a time, it has been felt that all these schemes need to be implemented in an integrated way so as to have wider coverage, greater thrust and visibility of minority education programme. In the Tenth Plan the aforesaid two schemes have been merged to form the Area Intensive and Madarsa Modernisation Programme.
The National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions 2004 has been set up by an Act of Parliament under which minority education institutions can seek affiliation to Scheduled Universities. University of Delhi, North Eastern Hill University; Pondicherry University; Assam University; Nagaland University and Mizoram University are at present in the Schedule.
