KATHMANDU, March 9: The Ministry of Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs has said that the final draft of the Education Regulation will be ready within a week. According to ministry officials, the draft will be then forwarded to the cabinet for approval.
After approval from the Ministry of Finance (MoF), the Ministry of Education (MoE) had forwarded the draft regulation to the law ministry one and a half months ago.
“The law ministry has told us that it will approve and send the draft to the education ministry within a week,” said Shanta Bahadur Shrestha, secretary at the MoE. “We will send the draft regulation to the cabinet for final approval immediately after we receive it from the law ministry,” he added.
The implementation of the regulation will require additional Rs 27 billion annually, according to MoE sources. However, the finance ministry had earlier estimated the annual implementation cost of the regulation at Rs 65 billion. The finance ministry had approved the draft while proposing that some financial concerns be implemented phase-wise.
The draft regulation has categorized education as Grades 0-8 as basic/elementary education and Grades 9-12 as secondary education. Similarly, the draft regulation requires private schools to pay their teachers salaries that match the government pay scale. Likewise, the draft has provisions for free secondary education, and transfer of school teachers, among others.
The government has allocated Rs 116 billion for the education sector in the current fiscal year. The final draft of the Education Regulation, aimed at implementing the eighth amendment of Education Act 2016, was submitted to the MoF about a month ago. The act was implemented eight months ago.
The new education regulation has proposed hiring some 30,000 teachers, including for child development centers, which are considered as pre-primary schools.
The government has allocated only around 12 percent of the total budget for the education sector this year though Nepal has pledged at international forums to allocate 20 percent of its total budget for the education sector.
Education Regulation forwarded to Law Ministry for final touch
