Uniform and inclusive education through common school system and promoting good citizenship with constitutional morality among students must be the priority in our education policy as so much we are talking about the National Education Policy (NEP) these days.
Education is one of the most powerful means of social and economic transformation that reduces disparity and discrimination but unfortunately, the prevailing education policy has rather encouraged inequality and deprivation.
Almost in all democratic countries of the world, mass education is free, universal and accessible to all as an equal opportunity without discrimination irrespective of social identity, faith and economic status. But still there is continued inequality in many forms being allowed in India which is against the very spirit of our Constitution and specially the Right to Education Act. Inequality in access to quality education is violation of Article 21A, 29 (2), 15 and 46 of the Constitution and RTE Act, 2009. It violates the dreams of Ram Mohan Ray, Syed Ahamad Khan and Jotirao Phule and many others wanted to build an inclusive India.
Considering the present State of affairs, the public perception about mass education system in Odisha is highly discouraging and hopeless and many of educationists say it is completely in a mess without vision and purpose. There are varieties of schools with different syllabus and medium of instruction and different ranges of teachers in the absence of a common school system. The syllabi, language, quality of teaching and infrastructural facilities are not uniform. There are elite English medium schools run by corporates and there are schools in local and regional vernacular medium without basic minimum infrastructure and qualified teaching staff.
There are hundreds of schools with single teacher, without class room and drinking water facility. Many of the teachers are low paid, even less than the minimum wage declared for unskilled workers of the State. There has been no social security benefit and now mostly the Government encourages contractual appointment to avoid all protective regulations of employment. The standard of teachers and their salaries also vary. The very discriminatory practice of Government in dealing with mass education has wider ramification over social life and economic wellbeing of the State. The poor and marginalized in rural and tribal dominated areas are innocent victims of such education system of the Government.
It is observed that a class of urban elites with secured salaried income has been able to access quality education of national standard for their children while a vast majority of common people are left without option but to follow the prevailing Government system. The illiterate mass and poor are generally unaware about the future of their children and about the education system.
The educated and rich class does not worry about the education of the masses even though it is a constitutional mandate before the Government. Teachers' strike is a common feature, where thousands of teachers demonstrate for salary hike and job regularisation often.
The Annual Status of Education Reports by NGO Pratham is alarming which points to the poor quality of education in Odisha. It says that among rural children in standard three, 9.7% cannot read letters and nearly 20% cannot read words. It is told that reading is a foundational skill of a child without which he/she cannot make any progress. The basic reading, writing and arithmetic calculation skills are very poor among Government-run rural schools’ children.
The National University for Education and Planning and Administration Report 2014 raised concern over quality and equity for achieving quality education for all. The national achievement survey for class three by NCERT found that performance of students of Odisha was significantly below national average in both language and mathematics. The most recent ranking of colleges based on quality by national institutional ranking framework 2017 under MHRD, Government of India, in the country has not found any college of the State among best 100 colleges of the country.
The poor quality of mass education has been influencing the quality of secondary and higher education of the State. The mental and physical development of a child at primary level is very important for his/her future development but unfortunately, the Government run schools in rural areas have not adequate infrastructure and conducive learning environment for the growth of the children. Studies have found that along with poor student- teacher ratio and inadequate infrastructure, the teachers’ absenteeism is one of the major reasons for the poor quality of learning outcome. It is estimated that about 25% of teachers were absent every day which affects the learning process in schools. In order to improve the quality of education in Government run schools, the Allahabad High Court in a directive ordered all Government servants of the State to send their children to schools run by State Basic Education Board of UP.
The poor spending of Government on education has not improved though it has been recommended that minimum six per cent of the GDP must be spent on education. The CAG report of Odisha says in spite of huge resources being spent in the primary education system of the State, it has not qualitatively improved. So it is not just resources but the political and administrative will of the Government which is equally important to improve the quality of primary education.
It is found that the Government schools are slowly getting deserted without students. The corporates are coming up with highly paid schools to meet the interest of children of a very specific class of people. This is perpetuating graded inequality in access to education and further dividing our society by promoting a privileged few.
Education business in the State encourages all kinds of discrimination against the poor and socially marginalised groups and discouraging their entry to knowledge and information for a dignified life. It is systematically excluding the poor and marginalised while promoting a class of people. Are we going to address all these issues in our NEP, 2020?
(manasbbsr15@gmail.com)
