This year marks the passage of a historic legislation in the Parliament of India – the Right to Education Bill. Seven years after education was made a fundamental right with the 86th Amendment to the Indian Constitution, the politicians found the will to finally pass a legislation that makes this right enforceable and justiciable. While the Bill, in its final form, leaves much to be desired, and in several instances, threatens to undo the good work done by thousands of NGOs in the field of education, we still believe that it is a step in the right direction.

At the same time, it makes it all the more urgent that organizations like Asha, with your continued support, help the existing schools that we support continue to function well, so that they can continue to serve the populations that they have been working with, with a Government licence. For this to happen, like in the past years, we need your support to make this year’s Work An Hour a big success. Please take a moment to read about the wonderful work that the partners who are selected for funding this year are doing and contribute towards supporting their efforts. Many of your companies match the contributions that you make, so we urge you to send us that information as well.

These are exciting times. Unlike last year, we have the Right to Education as a fundamental right now. Combined with the Right to Information, this provides civil society with a powerful tool to ensure that the Government does provide free and quality education to all. Whenever we encounter shortfalls or corrupt practices in the implementation, we can use RTI to ask for details about the budget and other implementation specifics and hold the Government accountable. In addition to your generous support towards this year’s Work An Hour campaign, we hope that you will continue to work with us and be our eyes and ears to ensuring that we get the provisions of the Bill implemented in the best way possible.

We are also in the process of detailing out our objections to the Bill as passed, and suggestions for improvement. Once we have that information on our website, we do hope that we will receive your support in making this heard far and wide.

Thank you and hope that you will help us make this year’s WAH campaign a great success!

-Anand
Asha Silicon Valley