Finance minister AHM Mustafa Kamal has allocated Tk 661 billion for the education sector which is Tk52.87 billion more than the previous year.
He said this while reading out the proposed budget for the fiscal year of 2020-21 on Thursday.
According to budget documents, allocation for the education sector was Tk611.18 billion in the ongoing fiscal year.
The minister allocated Tk249.37 billion for the primary and mass education ministry, Tk331.18 billion for secondary and higher education division and Tk83.45 billion for technical and madrasa education division.
He told the parliament, “You are aware that we have declared holidays to all academic institutions of the country since mid-March as part of our efforts to enforce social distancing to contain the spread of novel coronavirus”.
This has essentially caused a discontinuation of regular academic curriculum of around 40 million students across the country, he pointed out.
“Our most important task in education for the next fiscal year would be to bring back continuity in the curriculum and cover this loss from a long study break”, the finance minister said.
Talking about primary and mass education, he said primary education is the stepping stone for creation of skilled human resources, which in turn is the prerequisite for economic development.
“Hence, we have given higher priority on primary education, and in the Seventh Five Year Plan, we have set out bold targets to achieve cent per cent enrollment in primary education,” he added. ♦
