Despite historical promises of increased investment in the education sector, national budget allocations have consistently fallen short, said Rasheda K Choudhury, an eminent educationist and former advisor to the caretaker government.
"While the budget allocation for education has slightly increased, the number of students is growing rapidly every year. As a result, the government's per student allocation is decreasing," she said at a budget dialogue organised by the Centrr for Policy Dialogue (CPD) on Wednesday.
"Though the budget speech mentions the priority of education, it is neglected in allocation. And often, the entire allocated amount is not even spent and is returned," she added.
Highlighting the insufficiency in education and health sector allocations, she referenced Bangabandhu's 1974 statement that investment in education is the best investment.
"We talk extensively about Bangabandhu's dream, but where is the implementation of that dream?" questioned Rasheda.
"Even now, the government's expenditure on the education sector is considered an allocation. However, many years ago, Bangabandhu identified it as an investment," she said.
"In the revision of the current fiscal year's Annual Development Programme (ADP), while other sectors faced cuts, the allocations for education and health were cut drastically," she noted.
Expressing disappointment over the reduction of Tk12,000 crore from the education sector and Tk4,000 crore from the health sector in the ADP allocation, she asked, "Why is education always the first to be hit in budget cuts? Why is there no implementation capacity?"
Rasheda also mentioned that despite talks of digital learning and distance learning, taxes on mobile voice calls and data have been increased.
"ICT, teacher training, and digital labs are often discussed, but the reality is that most of these infrastructures are ineffective," she concluded.
