The Constitution (Eighty Sixth Amendment) Act, 2002 inserted Article 21A in the Constitution of India to provide free and compulsory education of all children in the age group of six to 14 years as a Fundamental Right. The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (RTE) Act, 2009, represents consequential legislation envisaged under article 21A. This Act provides that every child has a right to full time elementary education of satisfactory and equitable quality in a formal neighbourhood school which satisfies certain essential norms and standards.

Article 21A and the RTE Act, 2009 came into effect on 1 April 2010. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) is the main programme for universalising elementary education. SSA is also the main vehicle for implementing the provision of the RTE Act, 2009. Its overall goals include universal access and retention, bridging of gender and social category gaps in education and enhancement of learning levels of children.

In terms of Section 38(1) of the RTE Act, 2009 the State has come out with its own set of rules named ‘The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Rules (Tripura)’, 2011 which was notified in July 2011 and came into effect from August 2011. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) was being implemented in Tripura through a society named “Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, Rajya Mission Tripura” from May 2004.

One of the major achievement of the State in implementation of RTE Act, 2009 had been improvement in retention rate of students in school and decline in dropout rate. However, lack of a comprehensive approach in its execution had resulted in many areas remaining unaddressed. As a result, issues of quality remained a major area of concern. The status of training of teachers was poor with only 15.86 per cent of its teachers at primary level and 17.29 per cent at upper primary level could be trained.

Inadequate infrastructure in the schools had acted as a constraining factor in ensuring an atmosphere conducive for imparting education. Due to improper planning and delay in implementation of the programme, huge amount of funds remained unspent at the end of every year.

Monitoring was poor. Review meetings of monitoring committee were inadequate at every level on implementation of RTE Act, 2009. Shortfall in SMC meetings at the school level were indicators of the lack of internal control even at the individual school level resulting in poor implementation or non implementation of provisions of the Act.