Agartla,a May 9 : Tripura will be declared a fully literate state by September this year, chief minister Manik Sarkar said here on Wednesday.
"We are targeting next September, when we will achieve 100 per cent literacy", said Sarkar.
Tripura, till 2011, was the third most literate state in the country.
Provisional data for the 2011 census puts Tripura's literacy at 87.75 per cent, behind only Kerala with 93.91 and Mizoram with 91.58. That in itself marks a huge jump from 2001, when Tripura was the 12th most literate state at 73.19 per cent.
According to the state's own assessment, by now Tripura has crossed the 90-per-cent mark in literacy.
The State Literacy Mission Authority chaired by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar, has set September 8, World Literacy Day, as its deadline for achieving the target of cent percent literacy.
The SLMA, includes all ministers, the secretaries of all departments and representatives from gram panchayats and zilla parishads.
Since the Left Front took over in 1978, education has been getting among the highest budgetary allocations; we have never ever gone below 20 per cent in any budget.
Another acheviment of Tripura is its march towards female literacy that has grown better than male literacy, having risen 18.24 points from 64.91 per cent in 2001 to 83.15 in 2011, against a male literacy rise of 11.18 points — from 81 per cent to 92.18.
