Frontier, August 01, 2004

A K Biswas

THE BUDGET 2004-'05 P Chidambaram, India's Finance Minister presented in the Parliament on the 8th July is unique: it proposes to levy cess @2% across all taxes--direct and indirect, service. This was never done nor thought of in the past. For the first time any government attempted something as such. Three or four years back the Government of Punjab was in the news that education cess in sales of liquors was contemplated in the state. Nothing much is known thereafter. But the Government of India aims at moping up a sum of Rs 5000 crore for primary education exclusively for the poor. The Finance Minister's budget speech projecting the noble objective in this behalf is soul stirring. "The poor want basic education for their children: we shall provide it, and we shall make sure that the child remains in the school for at least eight years. We shall also make sure that the child is not hungry while he or she is at school."

In the long course of Indian history, a decisive step coupled with fulsome commitment is unheard of. What does Chidambaram mean by education of the poor? This, in all intent and purposes, would mean education for the socially degraded and deprived. The underdog and the marginalized are in the centre of his attention. Of course, the backward classes and minorities too will benefit.

The misfortune of the country is that the first budget of independent India presented after 15th August 1947 didn't do it. The bold and commendable initiative for funds should have come right then. The persons in authority neglected that responsibility and thereby, to be candid, committed an unpardonable crime against the nation. This is a crime against 500 millions of Indians.

Chidambaram mastered courage to articulate the Government resolve when Indians are the educational destitutes of the globe. In 2000 India boasted of 50% illiterates of the universe. In concrete terms, it means, one of out two illiterates across the universe was an Indian. Educational planners, administrators, experts and specialists had held out this catastrophic prospect, stating in the face of India during the Education Summit 1993 held at Delhi.

Desperation, therefore, drove the government for a cover. It is a glaring failure for a country though Indians are not making pretentious claim that since the dawn of civilization people have cultivated knowledge with avid interest and dedication. Notwithstanding the age-old legacy, the nation suffers the indelible shame. So anxiety in certain quarters to sweep the dirt under the thick, but colorful carpet was paramount. The most convenient strategy for a quick solution, therefore, was education for the adult through non-formal initiatives. In 2001, the nation, nay, the world was told that India has achieved 65% literacy notwithstanding the fact that the nation moved at a snail's speed since 1951. There was certain caste in the country whose literacy was just 3.12% in 1991 when the census returned the national literacy at 51.5%. The Musahars in Bihar illustrate the case. Now the detailed data on literacy reported by media say that national literacy was 64.8% in 2001; male at 73.3% as against female literacy 53.7% registering 14.4% rise in the latter's case and 11% rise in the former. This should otherwise be cheered as a great leap forward.

But is that true? One would still not outlive his nagging suspicion: weren't these data fudged for consumption of the foreign countries? India in the comity of developed and affluent nations e.g. USA, UK, Germany, France, Benelux etc. is what Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, [BIMARU states] in the context of developed states within. Even many African countries, after their liberation from colonial domination long after India, have achieved much higher rates of education. Within the country BIMARU states are subject of unmixed ridicule, so is India in any global forum. A casual travel through the length and breadth will expose any person to the futility of the fervid claims made in official documents. The ground realities are gnawing. The governing class has a deep-rooted vested interest in retaining illiteracy in tact at the grassroots for reasons of electoral gains and social supremacy. Illiteracy allows them an unchallenged sway over the masses. Subservient and docile, they are referred as garbage population.

The census data dished out ceremonially are useful in global forum for advocating India's case in securing loans, grants support, and the like. The developed nations are worried more than Indians themselves that half a billion population bereft of education is capable of pulling down the shinning edifice of their heavens. The ruling class ignores this danger in India. Being tutored and pressurized by the donor countries, the Government almost after sixty years of independence has woken up from slumbers to the realization that the shameful blot of illiteracy in India must end.

Incidentally all the way they have talked of literacy for the masses. Why can't they ever think of "education" for the poor? Why must they be content to give them only literacy? Or why should one suppose that the receivers would be happy with literacy only? Is it enough for them to read a newspaper and sign their names on some document, e.g. ration cards, and bank loans at el? Is that all they can genuinely offer to the masses? This is not education at all. This is hypocrisy on the part of a nation towards a vast section of its population calculated to keep them under heels of the privileged. The first ever move, therefore, to impose education cess is welcome.

It has, however, attracted already attention of the alarmists and obscurantist elements, which are likely to attack it on many grounds. The sole objective would be to foil education reaching the poor masses comprising the scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, minorities and backward classes. As scriptural slave, the Brahminical Hindu might do everything possible to keep the sections living at the bottom of the social pyramid in the abyss of darkness as longer as possible, if not eternity. Lack of funds is a convenient ploy to subterfuge the antipathy of the powerful upper castes against expansion of education aiming at the underdogs. This springs out of their unswerving attitudinal hostility. About 70 years ago Katherine Mayo, who, in any case, was no friend of India unlike many infatuated foreigners absolutely focused in her observation:

"... if Indian self-government were established tomorrow, and if wealth tomorrow rushed in, succeeding poverty in the land, India, unless she reversed her own views as to her "Untouchables" and as to her women, must still continue in the frontline of the earth's illiterates.''

Neither foreign domination nor lack of resources was actually the root cause of illiteracy in India. The problem of illiteracy lies elsewhere. Has India reversed her attitude to these two populous elements i.e. untouchables euphemistically called scheduled castes and tribes and women of Indian population? The Indian privileged classes, who were required to revise their views, there is genuine reason to apprehend, have not done so and will exert pressure to frustrate government's policy across the country even if education cess is levied. The government will watch helplessly as they would not be able to move against them. The failure on education front has to be tolerated else the powerful Indian privileged would wreck the Government itself.

The educational backwardness in India must be traced to the attitudinal problems on the part of the upper castes. One may briefly refer to the Japanese experience in achieving complete cent percent education for its population. The Meiji restoration saw total elimination of illiteracy there. 'I he regime's policy was simple and unambiguous: "Henceforth throughout the land without distinction of class or sex, in no village there shall be a house without learning, in no house an ignorant individual," This was enshrined in the famous school regulation issued in 1872. It enjoined further: "Every guardian acting in accordance with this, shall bring up his children with tender care, never failing to have them attend school." Since the Japanese government emphasized "state rather than private education at primary-school level, Japanese children of all social classes shared the same kind of schooling for the, first six years of school, reading the same text books, learning the same poems, acquiring the same values." This further resulted in dismantling distinction in the society. Experts found that "The educational system also facilitated high rates of intergenerational social mobility, and they weakened class divisions."

This sounds unimaginable in India, thanks to caste stratification. Scriptural injunctions bedevil the national wellbeing, moral and material prosperity. Myron Weiner found "Education in India is also regarded as a form of social superiority. Those who are educated dress and speak differently than those who are not educated. Those who are educated have power over those who are not. The educated can give commands to and shout at the uneducated and can expect deference and obedience.'' The commander does not want to forego his privilege as also pleasure of issuing commands to his inferior populace... will he?

Amartya Sen' s Pratichi Trust found in 2002 that "As far as primary education is concerned, villages with SC, ST and Muslim populations have less accessibility to primary schools." The report further specifies, "Caste feelings and biases were found to prevail in the villages of the three (survey) districts... in Purulia the degree was a bit higher. The degree of absenteeism of teachers was found to be higher in the SC and ST villages... The teachers also neglect the children from poor and less powerful backgrounds.''? The Nobel laureate has used very amiable term to indicate scheduled castes, tribes, Muslims by "poor and less powerful backgrounds." The report also showed how patronage was extended on caste line to benefit upper caste men and women in the so-called cultural highland of West Bengal where untouchability was practised in survey districts without any shame or embarrassment. One would not be unjustified to ask: "Is the cancer confined in the survey districts alone? How other parts of the state have remained immune?"

Exactly a century back, Lord Curzon, the most hated Governor General of India issued his Indian Education Policy. In course of analyzing the bottlenecks for expansion of primary education he observed, "It may be said indeed that the expansion of primary schools has received a check in recent years from the calamities of famine and plague; and it is further impeded by the indifference of the more advanced and ambitious classes to the spread of primary education.''

Notice the words of the Viceroy's raising his accusing finger for failure in the official policy document in 1904 to the "the indifference of the more advanced and ambitious classes to the spread of primary education., Famine is a history of the yesteryear. India has become self-sufficient in food production. The nation's water management is highly developed to combat natural calamities e.g. droughts that cause famine. The government now boasts of huge surplus of food stocks. The plague is no more a nightmare as it was for 30-35 years from 1897 onwards. The visitation of the dreadful disease in Surat, the industrial hub of Gujarat was a passing phase in 1994. But education for the masses continues to be plagued unabated by the self-same elements Curzon pinpointed as obstructionists in 1904. In the backdrop of Charles Wood Despatch advocating education for the masses, Pandit Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar addressed a letter on 29th September 1859 to John Peter Grant, the Lieutenant Governor of Bengal:

"An impression appears to have gained ground, both here and in England, that enough has been done for the education of the higher classes and that attention should now be directed towards the education of the masses... An enquiry into the matter will, however, show a very different state of things. As the best, if not the only practicable means of promoting education in Bengal, the Government should, in my humble opinion, confine itself to the education of the higher classes on a comprehensive scale. [emphasis added by the author] Vidyasagar, who was the principal of Sanskrit College, Calcutta, was one of the five Indian fellows of the Calcutta University established two years ago in 1857. In that capacity he addressed the letter. One would be aghast to hear this brazen advocacy of a person, who has been hailed as the finest flower of Bengal renaissance in the nineteenth century. This, in effect, resulted in lopsided expansion of education and gave birth to vested interest in a country badly ridden by Caste. Skewed growth of education creates a privileged section in the society, Driven by self-interest, they then find it necessary to oppose others getting into the same privilege on various grounds, The privileged and vested interest groups ultimately become desperate to scuttle all well meaning schemes designed to benefit the underprivileged. With due respect to all his contribution to the society, we must not hesitate to state that the exhortation of Pandit Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar was fraught with serious danger for any nation and can hardly be viewed with equanimity of mind, Besides it was utterly putrid.

Lord Ripon, the Governor General of India in his convocation address to Calcutta University on the 1lth March 1882 underlined the grave and harmful consequences. "It is not desirable in any country to have a small highly educated class brought into contact with a large uneducated masses: what is wanted is, instruction should be more equally distributed, that the artisans and peasants of the land should have brought within their reach facilities as may be possible under the circumstances of their condition, and that there should be no sharp line drawn between the educated few and the ignorant and untrained many." India has, unfortunately, done what should not have been done. India's time honoured policy has been to keep many illiterates at the mercy of educated few, who have ruthlessly exploited and deprived the vast majority with impunity. The higher classes, which in all import and purposes signified the higher castes, have clannishly opposed and deliberately foiled all efforts including constitutional mandate for expansion of education for the masses. This is the basic problem why education is not allowed for all.

The Wood's Despatch is considered on all hands as the Magna Carte of education of the Indian masses. Foundation for education on comprehensive scale should have been laid right there and then in mid-nineteenth century.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

@ Copyright, Germinal Publications Pvt. Ltd., Calcutta.