See Full Document Text
GOVERNMENT OF INDIA
MINISTRY OF EDUCATION
DEPARTMENT OF SCHOOL EDUCATION & LITERACY
RAJYA SABHA
UNSTARRED QUESTION NO.526
ANSWERED ON 04/02/2026
Infrastructure development under the 'PM-SHRI' scheme
526 # Smt. Sunetra Ajit Pawar:
Will the Minister of Education be pleased to state:
(a) whether Government is aware that thousands of teaching positions are lying vacant in Zila
Parishad and aided schools in Maharashtra, which is adversely affecting teaching and learning;
(b) the funds allocated for infrastructure development under the 'Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan' and
'PM-SHRI' schemes in Maharashtra during the last two years and the amount utilized thereof; and
(c) whether Government has formulated any specific time-bound plan to address the lack of digital
literacy and internet connectivity in schools located in rural and tribal areas of the State?
ANSWER
MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF EDUCATION
(SHRI JAYANT CHAUDHARY)
(a): Education being a subject in the Concurrent List of the Constitution, and majority of the
schools in the country comes under the administrative control of respective States/ Union
Territories (UTs). Further, the recruitment, service conditions and rational deployment of teachers
come under the purview of the respective State Governments/UT Administrations. Samagra
Shiksha norms provide for States/UTs to undertake a deployment of teachers through a transparent
online platform to ensure that the Right to Education (RTE) stipulations are adhered.
(b): The details of funds allocated and released under Samagra Shiksha and PM SHRI scheme
for the State of Maharashtra in last two year is as under:
Samagra Shiksha:
(₹ in crores)
Financial Year Central Allocation Central release
2023-2024 1317.43 1001.19
2024-2025 1423.74 1126.24
PM SHRI:
(₹ in crores)
Financial Year Central Allocation Central release
2023-2024 126.81 63.40
2024-2025 339.37 226.15
(c): A comprehensive initiative called PM eVidya was initiated as part of ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat
Abhiyaan’ on 17th May, 2020, which unifies all efforts related to digital/online/on-air education to
enable multi-mode access to education across the country under the aegis of National Education
Policy (NEP) 2020. States/UTs collaborate with NCERT to utilise, the effectiveness of these
initiatives as per their requirements in mother tongue/local/regional languages. PM eVidya includes200 DTH TV Channels allotted to States/UTs/Autonomous Bodies (ABs)/Other Ministries in
Government of India and 400 Radio channels to enable them to provide supplementary education as
per their requirement in various Indian languages for classes 1-12.
Digital Infrastructure for Knowledge Sharing (DIKSHA) is the Nation’s One Nation, One
Digital platform for providing quality e-content for school education including Government schools
in States/UTs along with QR coded Energised Textbooks (ETBs) for all grades. As a participant in
DIKSHA, States/UTs/ABs have generated and contributed over 3.7 lakh content in mother
local/regional languages enabling multilingualism. DIKSHA Offline supports areas with limited or
no internet connectivity. The stakeholders have access to more than 450+ Virtual Labs and 100
Virtual skill labs (50 each in Hindi and English) on DIKSHA.
Additionally, the Government of India, in the Budget 2025, has announced provision of
broadband connectivity to all Government Secondary schools in rural areas under the ‘BharatNet’
project to enhance digital infrastructure in remote areas by BSNL in a phased manner, including
921 schools from Maharashtra.
For internet connectivity, an advisory has been issued by the Department of School
Education and Literacy, Government of India to all the States and UTs to enter into an MoU/
Agreement with BSNL and provide Fiber to the Home (FTTH) Internet connection to all the
Government Schools which have computing devices.
*****