Introduction

India's future seems to be in danger as an education scam, costing Rs 1,000 Crore, has been unearthed in Maharashtra. Citing the scam, the state government started investigation to find out how many students on the rolls of state run and government aided schools are bogus. The scam started towards the end of September but came into existence only in the first week of October, 2011 The schools and education minister Rajendra Darda stated We found that some divisions altogether did not exist. In some places, same students were made to sit for the morning school and afternoon schools during the inspection".

Causes or Footways that led to the scam

1) Falsified names and strength to claim state aid that went to pay salaries and expenses towards mid-day meals: In order to be able to take full benefit of the fund that is allocated to each educational institute, the students present in the school/education centre were falsified. Reason being that the school would use this fund in paying the salaries and all other expense and the remainder would go into the pockets of the management. 2) Salaries being paid less: It is also a reality that despite grants, teachers are paid less than the prescribed salaries but the figures mentioned in the ledgers are as per the scales. Moreover each school which is run or founded by a politician have been able to stop the officials from actually looking into the matter before the scam took place.

Where all did the scam surface

The scam got unearthed in the Nanded district of Maharashtra where more than 1,40,000 students were termed as bogus or fake, the governments calculations after the Nanded revelations, which involved only 3,475 schools inspected by 346 squads, are that the fake claims led to grants towards salaries to the extent of Rs 1,000 Crore exclusive of the midday meal funding. One of the ways resorted to has come to light in Sholapur, where school staffs were deployed to hunt for any stray child of school-going age because, as against 252 students on its rolls, only 70 existed. In another instance, the school management ferried children from across the border in Karnataka to match the numbers on the benches with those in the records. Anticipating a sealing of the borders, they were imported a day earlier. It also means that all numbers mentioned in the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan are a fraud, because there are children out there to be hired for a short time because they dont go to schools.

What did the state government do in order to curb this problem?

After the first clue that had come under the watch of the Maharashtra State government, the state government in lieu of the education minister drew a conclusion that a survey would be needed to take place so that each student can be recorded correctly, Indelible ink was used as a mean to track each student, so that no copies of the same student could be made. The entire process was carried over the Nanded district in 3500 schools out of which 1500 belong to the Zilla parishad and the remaining 2000 belong to private aided schools The inspection was undertaken by 346 squads, excluding the education officials for reasons that were to be made clear. Gradually the reasons did show and it became clear they didnt want the educational officials while conducting the survey, so that no unrecorded entry would go by.

Analysis
Looking at the entire scam, only one conclusion can be drawn that the reason why the educational system was setting up isnt serving its purpose, in fact in other instances it is doing things which is not only immoral but also posing a threat for the new generation who are supposed to uplift the country, As seen in the Nanded district many students were faked on the records to get additional grants and utilize these funds to either pay the salaries or pocket it for their own benefit. In light of the same the instances where children were ferried across the shore just to be shown as recorded in the records can be another example in which the country fails to grow, at the end of the day even thou we are growing in monetary aspects we still arent achieving the potential that we have by doing these forms of corruption. Moreover the country as a whole suffers in scams like these because more than required grants are given to the authorities who misuse them for their own personal use. The scam leads from one thing to another, and if gone unwatched can lead to affect the whole country. As of now Maharashtra is affected by the scam but the question still remains what about rest of the country. Even after all the surveys and checks are done another question remains what about the teachers that were hired to teach, they would all be out of jobs. So according to us the government should make necessary provisions for them probably employ them in programmes which talk about the various benefits that education can provide.

What other measures could be taken to find out if the problem prevails in the other districts as well
Apart from the already on going checks and surveys, the state government should look into:

a) Registering all the un-registered schools and educational institutes: By doing this the state government can look into or check each school and the total strength of the school with ease, also providing funds to these schools could be properly broke down, so that no wastage or unneeded expense will be incurred b) Preparing a break up of all the funds needed to be put into schools: A systemized breakup of the funds should be done in order to see how much funds would be needed by the school/educational institute c) Salary Slabs: The teachers should be paid according to the salary slab, and the state government should keep a six month check and also the teachers could give their views and comments on whether if they do receive the pay properly or not.

What future mends can be done, so that scams like these dont arise again
a) Review System: A nationwide review system can be implemented to look into the data of all the registered schools/educational institutes , this could be implemented in the following phase: i) Each school will be registered along with the total strength of the school and the number of students present should be mentioned as well A database should be kept so that each school/educational institute can list the students names and ID as well Each registered school should have a virtual database apart from the physical records and the government should help the aided schools to do so.

ii)

iii)

Limitations and References

Limitations: a) Less information: As the scam is currently on going the information and findings were limited over the different web sites

References: a) http://broadbandforum.in/desh-ko-bech-daalo/73362-maharashtra-school-scam-1-

lakh/
b) http://diplomafraud.com/2012/05/08/2500-fake-schools-to-be-shut-in-maharashtra/

c) http://news.oneindia.in/2011/10/09/rs-1-000-cr-education-scam-unearthed-in-

maharashtra.html
d) http://news.in.msn.com/national/article.aspx?cp-documentid=5439427 e) http://www.firstpost.com/mumbai/what-next-sirji-rs-1000-cr-maharashtra-fake-

students-scam-99668.html