Justice Varale: Kumbh Mela Funds Could Save Marathi Schools

Supreme Court Justice Prasanna B Varale recently raised serious concerns over the declining budget for education in Maharashtra, contrasting the closure of State-run Marathi medium schools with the massive public expenditure on events like the Nashik-Trimbakeshwar Simhastha or Nashik Kumbh Mela. The judge was speaking at an event organised by a high school in Dhule district of Maharashtra, where he had been a student for a few years. The event was an inauguration of 'smart classes'. In his address, Justice Varale highlighted how essential educational infrastructure continues to suffer despite grand government allocations for other initiatives. He referred to recent announcements regarding government expenditure on the Nashik-Trimbakeshwar Simhastha Kumbh Mela and major infrastructure corridors.“The government claims to allocate vast funds for various initiatives. The Deputy Chief Minister mentioned ₹32,000 crore and the Chief Minister mentioned ₹34,000 crore for the Kumbh Mela. I read elsewhere about ₹11,000 crore being allocated for a corridor project,” Justice Varale pointed out.He added that even a tiny fraction of such spending could revive hundreds of struggling educational institutions across the state.“I have no objection whatsoever to the thousands of crores being spent by the government on various development initiatives. However, if out of these thousands of crores of allocated funds, even just 0.1%—around ₹32 crore—were spent by the government, then 100 to 12