Breaking away from the clutches of illiteracy
The road to reform and growth is today well marked, and if India
has to take on the challenges of
international competition and economic growth, every Indian
should be kept away from the
clutches of illiteracy.
INDIA CAN boast of the largest educational network in the world
and the country has undoubtedly
made considerable technical progress and, we are bound to reach
greater heights in future. No
wonder Amartya Sen remarked "The number of students enrolled
in higher education in India is
considerable distance ahead of any other country of comparable
economic level." Yet, we house the
largest number of adult illiterates in the world — an appalling
290 million. In a country where 25
million people are homeless and 172 million people have no access
to drinking water, the illiteracy
rate is nothing much to be alarmed about, if only the high illiteracy
rate was not a bottleneck to
growth and economic progress. Why is it that, 54 years after
independence, we have not been able
to achieve universal literacy, in spite of producing excellent
software engineers, mathematical
geniuses and innovative scientists?
At the time of independence, India inherited an expanding system
of English education created by
the British. The British built schools and colleges in cities,
which were supplemented by
missionary schools imparting English education to produce pseudo
anglicised ladies and
gentlemen. The result is a top-heavy educational system with
the bottom rung remaining
untouched by the system with their own illiteracy a hindrance
to improve their standard of living.
The vicious circle of poverty and illiteracy rotates to produce
more of the genre. Even after
independence, this casual attitude towards primary education
resulted in single teacher schools
without classrooms, classrooms without black boards, teachers
lacking ability and motivation,
unchecked absenteeism of the teacher and taught and, a high
drop out rate of the students.
India has been investing much less than many other Asian countries
in terms of educational
expenditure. As a nation, not only do we spend too little on
education, the efficiency of resource
utilisation has also been very poor. There is no accountability
of the primary education system.
We have not been able to achieve universal literacy mainly because
of improper planning and worst
implementation. There is need to hike the public expenditure
on literacy and primary education in
rural areas. The Centre, to enable all children in enrol in
school by 2003 has announced a scheme
called Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan. This scheme planned at macro level
does not produce great results,
mainly because of lack of infrastructure and micro-planning
at the grass root level. What we need,
is mammoth centralised planning and localised accountability.
Massive educational institutions,
that can accommodate 2000-3000 students in rural areas, which
can serve the vicinity of about 50
miles should be built. The Government should identify such growth
areas (without political
interference) and loop the villages around these schools with
motorable fast bus lanes. The free
transportation will take care of student mobility and the teachers
can utilise the fast bus lanes.
Teachers and other staff can also be accommodated near the scheme
to avoid commuting hardships.
A free meal scheme as it exists in Tamil Nadu will take care
of the nutritional needs of the
students.
The government schools must enrol students up to standard 10,
and all students who pass out of
these schools should be well versed in the language of the State
and English, besides having a
working knowledge of Hindi. Scientific knowledge should be the
basis of education, coupled with
computer training. Any child who comes out after 10 years of
schooling should be competent
enough to type a letter, ride a cycle and be proficient in a
vocational stream without any gender
discrimination. Building a massive educational institution in
a rural area can also make villages
the centre of development activity. The school building can
be used in the evenings for adult
education, women's development and also as temporary hospital
for immunisation and emergency
care.
Monitoring the health and nutrition needs of the school students
also becomes easy. The parents,
who will automatically come under the literacy net, can be persuaded
to adopt family planning
norms. Child labourers in the area can be easily identified
and brought into the mainstream of
education. As education is in the Concurrent List since 1976,
a project of this dimension, no doubt
will call for enormous Central and State level planning. The
sheer size of the nation by geographic
and human terms, no doubt will make policy formulations, coordination
and implementation a
very challenging task.
The seven fold strategy included in the Budget 2000-2001 to place
India on a higher growth plan,
has as its fifth strategy "accord high priority to human resource
development with special, emphasis
on the poorest and the weakest. By prioritising universal literacy,
we will be able to cut down on
subsidies, which deplete national resources and make long-term
investment for human development
to protect the vulnerable." How do we fund such an enormous
projects? In the name of poverty
alleviation, 460 billion rupees are budgeted every year on ineffective
schemes meant to help the
poor, most of which become colossal waste due to misappropriation,
political interference and
improper implementation.
A sizable chunk of this can be divested to build infrastructure
for primary education. Trimming
Central and State bureaucracy alone will save about one per
cent of the GDP a year, says a report
from the Harvard University. This amount can be used for universal
literacy infrastructure building,
while the retrenched employees can be retooled and trained into
multi-tasking operations for
literacy schemes on contractual basis. Other south Asian countries,
which are under a single party
rule or even totalitarian system, have achieved much higher
levels of education than democratic
India. Most of our schemes are wasted because of coalition governments,
suspecting
parliamentarians and selfish legislatures. To surmount political
hurdles of this nature, the
Government can even consider handing over the planning and implementation
to a third party, like
the Big Six management firms, UNICEF or any international consultancy
agency. The committees
and project planning as they exist today, are highly time consuming
and what is needed at this
juncture is quick planning and fast implementation.
The Pradhan Mantri Gramodya Yojana has already been launched
with the outlay of Rs. 5,000
crores. Rural infrastructure development and education can be
merged with this scheme with a
larger outlay and in a decade from now no Indian would remain
unlettered! A dream may be, but
dreams are the seeds behind blooming projects. At the time of
Independence, Jawaharlal Nehru
visualised the State as a benevolent neutral entity, interested
in promoting the welfare of the society
as a whole. Successive Governments have mouthed socialistic
slogans but over the years, the
commitment to socialistic ideology has waned.
We had drugged ourselves into believing that the achievement
of the minuscule section of the
society is the true reflection of the society as a whole. How
often we come across children barely
eight or nine years old, wanting to go to school, while the
nearest school is miles away with
walking being the only available mode of transportation to reach
the schools. Yet, those who live
in metropolitan cities blame them of lack of motivation! Since
the beginning of the decade, the
economic beliefs have shifted in favour of liberalisation in
line with the worldwide move from
socialism to a free market economy. The road to reform and growth
is today well marked, and if
India has to take on the challenges of international competition
and economic growth, every Indian
should be kept away from the clutches of illiteracy.
USHA SUBRAMANIAM