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FOR a nation that dreams of becoming smart and progressive, Bangladesh’s educational budget is anything but intelligent. Year after year, we manage the impossible: allocating theÌýlowestÌýproportion of GDP to education in all of South Asia. That’s not a passing trend; that’s an institutional achievement in national self-sabotage, if you will.

Bangladesh has spent 22 consecutive years allocating less than 2 per cent of its GDP to education. Meanwhile, UNESCO — clearly unaware of our budgetary gymnastics — continues to recommend 6 per cent. We smile, nod politely, and continue cutting corners. In the 2024–25 financial year, we have brought that number down to a mere 1.69 per cent of GDP. The dream of single-digit excellence, fulfilled.

For context, India spends 4.47 per cent of its GDP on education and Pakistan manages 2.38 per cent. Afghanistan, despite being a war-torn nation, allocates 4.1 per cent. Bhutan? A scholarly 7 per cent. Saudi Arabia, that oil-soaked desert of a monarchy, spends 7.81 per cent. But Bangladesh, brimming with ambition and national slogans, somehow just can’t afford to prioritise education.

Of course, there is method to this madness. A well-educated population might ask questions, demand accountability, or worse — develop critical thinking. Better to leave them comfortably uninformed. After all, ignorance is bliss and even more so if it’s policy.

This year, the annual development programme for education was slashed by Tk 2,971 crore — a neat 9.5 per cent drop from last year. That brings the education sector’s development allocation to Tk 28,557 crore, covering 91 projects. Yes, 91 fragmented, underfunded, sluggishly implemented projects. But no new initiatives. According to planning adviser Wahiduddin Mahmud, this year’s theme is ‘prioritising ongoing projects.’ Translation: hold the line, do the bare minimum and pray for development by osmosis.

It gets even more poetic. In terms of share in the overall ADP, education gets the third highest allocation. Impressive, until you realise it’s like being the third richest beggar in a refugee camp.

The pattern is depressingly familiar. In the 2009–10 financial year, education received around 2 per cent of GDP. By 2016–17, we hit a short-lived high of 2.49 per cent. Since then, it’s been a graceful nosedive. In 2022–23, it was 1.83 per cent. In 2023–24, 1.76 per cent. This year, 1.69 per cent. At this rate, we will soon be spending negative money on education and charging students to breathe near a classroom.

Economists often say that every 1 per cent increase in education investment leads to around a 9 per cent increase in individual income. Yet here we are, voluntarily keeping incomes — and minds — stunted. In Cuba, education expenditure is 12.9 per cent of GDP. The Marshall Islands, of all places, leads the way with 15.8 per cent. Meanwhile, we debate whether broken blackboards count as school furniture.

And let’s not forget the human resource disaster we politely call the teacher-student ratio. Globally, the standard is 1:20. In Bangladesh, it’s a festive 1:312 in government-controlled colleges. That’s not a class — it’s a flash mob. There are 5 million students in higher education and only 16,000 education cadre officers. To make matters more festive, 25 per cent of teaching posts in government colleges are vacant. In MPO-listed institutions, over a million teaching posts lie unfilled. In primary schools, 44,000 assistant teacher positions are vacant. But hey, who needs teachers when you can have TikTok?

Teacher salaries, naturally, match our national generosity. Bangladesh ranks lowest in South Asia in paying primary school teachers. So we ask them to raise the next generation on an income barely fit to raise a goat. Then we are shocked when the quality of education declines!

Of course, what we lack in substance, we make up for in rhetoric. Every government since independence has declared education to be a ‘top priority.’ Judging by allocations, it’s right up there with fixing sidewalks and repainting ministry walls. In the 2024–25 budget, education’s share is just 11.88 per cent. The educationists had demanded 20 per cent, but who listens to them? These people, with their books and their data and their insistence on logic, are clearly out of sync with our economic choreography.

Development experts have been pleading for at least 3 per cent of GDP to be allocated immediately and 20 per cent of the budget by 2030. The Mass Literacy Campaign presented this proposal in March, alongside recommendations for a roadmap. The response from policymakers was a dignified silence. Perhaps they were too busy attending budget seminars at foreign universities their children attend.

The irony, of course, is that education underpins everything. Health outcomes, employment, gender equality and economic growth — each is directly tied to education. Without educated citizens, even the fanciest flyovers and glittering smart cards become empty symbols. But education is long-term. It doesn’t offer quick photo ops. You can’t cut a ribbon for an idea. So we invest in roads, not reasoning; in concrete, not conscience.

When budget implementation is discussed, it’s treated as a justification for low allocation. ‘But only 81 per cent of the ADP was implemented last year,’ officials say, as though this were a reason to shrink the budget rather than fix the leak. That’s like saying, ‘We only used half the fire extinguisher last time, so let’s bring a lighter instead.’

There’s a strange cruelty in how we normalise this decay. Policymakers know that those who matter — their children — aren’t affected. They attend English-medium schools, fly off to foreign universities and return with degrees and disdain. Meanwhile, the children of the masses navigate overcrowded, underfunded, neglected institutions. The result is a tiered system that not only reproduces inequality but celebrates it.

Noam Chomsky warned that if we don’t believe in free education, we will end up paying for ignorance. We, however, have chosen the deluxe package: we are paying for ignoranceÌýandÌýcorruption. Mismanagement, ghost teachers, fake certificates and shady procurements — these are the true electives of our educational curriculum.

We still quote Mandela’s line: ‘Education is the most powerful weapon to change the world.’ But in Bangladesh, that weapon has been quietly removed from the syllabus. Instead, we hand students empty notebooks, outdated syllabuses and a promise that things will change — someday, perhaps.

In a country obsessed with megaprojects, the greatest megaproject — education — continues to rot. Because there’s no ribbon-cutting for critical thinking, no billboard for analytical minds and no inauguration for integrity.

Meanwhile, we prepare to present another national budget. On June 2, Dr Salehuddin Ahmed will announce it. The ADP has already been approved at Tk 2.30 trillion, down Tk 35,000 crore from last year. The education allocation has shrunk accordingly. Economists support trimming fat — but we are now cutting into bone.

If one were to write a national obituary, the cause of death would read: budgetary neglect, compounded by chronic indifference.

Perhaps that’s the grand plan. An uninformed population doesn’t protest. A citizenry that can’t critically analyse can’t organise. But when our children grow up — underpaid, undereducated and underwhelmed — will we tell them we didn’t know better? Or will we hand them the same script: ‘Study hard, so you can one day leave this country’?

There’s still time to change course. There’s still a future to rescue. But for that, we must invest in brains as passionately as we invest in bridges. Otherwise, the smart nation we dream of will exist only on promotional brochures — designed abroad, printed expensively and read by no one.

And so, while the rest of the world educates to elevate, we continue to chant slogans and build monuments to ignorance, to apathy and to a future we never bothered to prepare for.

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HM Nazmul Alam is an academic, journalist and political analyst.