Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin on Saturday said that the state will move the Supreme Court against the Centre for withholding funds of Rs 2,152 crore under the Samagra Shiksha scheme due to its refusal to implement the three-language policy, The Hindu reported.

“The funds that should have reached students and teachers are being withheld by the Union government due to petty politics,” Stalin said at an event in Chennai.

The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam leader referred to a statement by Union Home Minister Amit Shah from earlier this month that the government will promote Sanskrit through the National Education Policy, The New Indian Express reported.

“His [Shah’s] remarks confirm what we have long feared, that the policy is a deliberate attempt to undermine Tamil and other languages,” Stalin said.

The Tamil Nadu chief minister asserted that the only way to stop this trend was “by bringing education back to the State List”.

In February too, Stalin had accused the Centre of withholding funds as a tactic to coerce states to adopt centrally-mandated programmes.

He had written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking his intervention in getting dues under the scheme without linking them to the implementation of the 2020 National Education Policy.

The Samagra Shiksha scheme, implemented in 2018, is the scheme through which the Union government provides support for elementary and secondary school education.

It resulted from the merger of three schemes: Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan for universal elementary education, Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan for secondary and higher secondary schools and Teacher Training Education such as the District Institutes of Education and Training.

In April, the Union education ministry had told the Rajya Sabha that Tamil Nadu, Kerala and West Bengal received no funds under the central education scheme for 2024-’25.

Data shared in the Upper House by Minister of State for Education Jayant Choudhary showed that while Kerala was allocated Rs 328.90 crore, Tamil Nadu Rs 2,151.60 crore and West Bengal Rs 1,745.80 crore from the Centre for the current fiscal year under the scheme, no funds had been released to these states as of March 27.

Choudhary said that funds under the scheme, which is used for educational components like textbooks, infrastructure upgrades and teacher salaries, were released to states and Union territories based on several criteria.

The halt in funding to Kerala, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal comes against the backdrop of these states refusing to comply with the PM Schools for Rising India, or PM SHRI, scheme.

The centrally-sponsored scheme aims to upgrade the infrastructure of schools managed by central, state or regional bodies. However, to avail the scheme’s benefits, state governments must first sign a memorandum of understanding with the Centre to implement the 2020 National Education Policy.

The 2020 National Education Policy proposes major changes to the curricular structure for school education, claims to promote flexibility in choosing academic streams and emphasises on using the mother tongue as a key medium of instruction in primary school, among other measures.

The policy has been criticised by sections of the academic community, for encouraging the privatisation of public institutions. It was also criticised for creating numerous “exit” options for students, which opponents said would encourage dropouts.

Tamil Nadu has repeatedly expressed opposition to the three-language formula in the National Education Policy. The state government said it will not change its decades-old two-language policy of teaching students Tamil and English.

The three-language formula refers to teaching students English, Hindi and the native language of a state. It was introduced in the first National Education Policy in 1968 and was retained in the new policy introduced in 2020.

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