– Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)

Mamata Banerjee: too little too late

As west bengal hurtles toward the high-stakes legislative assembly election of April-May, chief minister Mamata Banerjee positioned at a historic crossroads, is confronted with the daunting prospect of a three-term anti-incumbency vote, and a BJP desperate to win the state for the first time.

The fiery leader, who famously toppled the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M)-led Left Front government which ruled West Bengal for 34 years uninterruptedly, in 2011, with the promise of poriborton (change), is now hearing that battle cry turned against her. Whereas the CPI-M de-industrialised Bengal through state encouraged labour militancy and capital flight, 15 years of TMC rule has left the state’s education sector in tatters through unprecedented teacher recruitment scams and high school dropout rates. With the public education system on the brink of collapse and the electorate’s trust in TMC at an all-time low, this election is a bare-knuckled fight for Banerjee’s political survival. A late-stage infrastructure overhaul of public schools may have come too late to stop the BJP’s aggressive “saffron surge”.

On February 26, Banerjee announced a substantial Rs.4,648 crore initiative to overhaul the state’s education and child-care infrastructure to restore public confidence in the state’s devalued school education system. Spearheading this initiative is a Rs.2,349.78 crore project, primarily funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) with a 30 percent contribution from the state, to transform 430 (out of 84,000) government schools into “model institutions”. Eighty-seven backward blocks of the state will receive two while at least one school will be upgraded in other blocks.

These model schools will be equipped with smart classrooms, digital facilities, modern laboratories, and improved sports infrastructure. Beyond physical infrastructure, education minister Bratya Basu promises contemporary pedagogy to make learning more engaging, and English-medium instruction alongside Bengali to be introduced to meet rising parental demand. To support this, the government plans to recruit specialised teachers for English-medium streams and implement a “hub and spoke” model under which the 60 model schools will share resources to elevate the standards of surrounding institutions.

simultaneously under a Rs.2,148 crore early childhood education improvement programme, 50,000 anganwadi centres (AWCs) will be renovated over five years. This project focuses on early childhood education and nutrition, buildings renovation, upgraded kitchens for mid-day meals, and the distribution of high-quality reading materials. To ensure professional early years education delivery, the TMC government is also investing in capacity-building programs for the state’s 200,000 anganwadi workers. Finance minister Chandrima Bhattacharya says the state invoked ADB assistance to fill the funding gap of Central government schemes.

However, objective monitors of West Bengal’s once-envied education system believe this multi-crore school education blitz just months before the assembly elections to repair damage of an education system defined by “bribes-for-jobs” scandals and systemic decay, has come too late to mask the hollowed-out reality of Bengal’s K-12 education system.

“With a formidable BJP election machine breathing down her neck and an electorate weary of three terms marred by corruption and the collapse of public institutions, Mamata Banerjee can no longer rely on fiery rhetoric or populist doles to maintain her mass leader status. Students and parents of West Bengal who experienced the nation’s longest Covid-19 school lockdown and betrayal of the 2011 promise of poriborton aren’t likely to be impressed by new paint and digital screens. For the TMC, the forthcoming election will be a referendum on its performance, and the mess that it has made of school education may well signal the end of its innings,” comments Suman Sengupta, a seasoned newspaper columnist of the Anand Bazar Patrika.

According to most independent monitors of West Bengal’s economy, on several metrics the track record of the three-term TMC government — industry and agriculture growth, law and order, attracting domestic and foreign investment and employment generation — is better than of its predecessor Left Front government. But in a state which accords high value to education and learning, the damage that TMC’s recurrent teacher recruitment and exam scams have inflicted on the education system is likely to prove its nemesis in the imminent assembly election.