New Delhi, Nov 10: Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee today expressed concern that economic barriers were blocking access to quality education for the masses which was crucial for capturing the opportunities in the emerging "knowledge economy". "The poor are right in demanding not simply 'education for all' but 'quality education for all'. However, realization of this right is becoming increasingly difficult in the fast-changing economic scenario. Market forces are shaping the growth of all layers of education, including elementary education", he said inaugurating the third high-level group meeting on education for all here. Observing that economic barriers preventing access to quality education for the masses had tended to rise, Vajpayee told the education ministers and a galaxy of dignitaries from various world bodies that the difference between the poor man's school and the rich man's school was becoming starker with each passing year. Stung by the recent UNESCO report on education which put India in the list of countries with a growing population of illiterates, human resource development minister Murli Manohar Joshi said that India, in fact, has seen a fall in the absolute number of illiterates during 1991/2001 for the first time despite an increase in population. Joshi said that UNESCO institute for statistics needed to gear itself up to accept data at relatively short notice and enhance its capacity of analysis and forecasting so that conclusions drawn by it were more realistic.Asserting that the steps taken by India gave a confidence that it would be able to achieve the goals of education for all (EFA) much before the 2015 deadline, Joshi said "unfortunately, the monitoring report brought out by the UNESCO institute for statistics has not been able to capture this progress despite India furnishing data.
It has also launched a comprehensive programme "Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan" for education of all children in the age group of 6 to 14 years. The Prime Minister said donor countries and institutions made a commitment at Dakar in 2000 that 'no country seriously committed to basic education will be thwarted in the achievement of this goal by lack of resources' and "now is the time to redeem this pledge". He regretted that the fast track initiative started by the international funding agencies last year had so far been neither fast nor adequate. "We need to accelerate the process if we wish to ensure that we do not slip on the deadlines set at Dakar in 2000", he said.