Main Presentation
WHITHER INDIAN EDUCATION
By K.N.Panikkar
The education in India is at a crossroads. Its
liberal and secular character and content, carefully nourished
during the last fifty years, despite several vicissitudes, is
now undergoing fundamental transformation. That this change rather
hurriedly pushed through by the government and its agencies is
not in consonance with the guiding principles of our republic
and would adversely affect the well being of our plural society
is a widely shared concern. For, the change is being engineered
by a government committed more by its ideological needs and the
entrepreneurial interests of the ruling classes rather than the
requirements of the society.
Admittedly, in class societies education is an
ideological apparatus of the state and is designed and used for
the perpetuation and furtherance of its interests. The ideological
apparatuses by their very nature function with considerable finesse,
obscuring and universalising partisan interests or imputing cultural
or national explanations for their initiatives. All these strategies
appear to be at work in foregrounding a new system of education
that uncritically privileges the indigenous and celebrates the
religious. It seeks to displace whatever secular and universal
content and outlook the existing system, although with obvious
limitations, has managed to incorporate and preserve.
Character of education in Post-independence
India
The system of education evolved during the post
independence period is essentially liberal and secular in
character. It draws upon the historical experience, both colonial
and pre-colonial, and the social, cultural and intellectual legacy
inherited there from. Although an enclavised system, mainly serving
the interests of the elite, it respected the social plurality
and cultural diversity of the country. While attempting to construct
the nation and unify the people, differences were accommodated,
even if the class and caste biases were apparent in policy formulation
and implementation. That education is a concurrent and not a central
subject reflects the respect for diversity.
The influence of colonial rule and western ideas,
which filtered through it, over the modern system of education
in India, is well known. The reconstruction of the system of education
in post-independent India was undertaken in the context of the
legacy of colonialism, both in policy and infrastructure. Yet,
the system that came into being, as a result of the deliberations
in several education commissions, chaired by eminent educationists
like Dr.S.Radhakrishnan and Dr.D.S. Kothari, was neither a continuation
of the colonial nor a blind adoption of the western. The main
concern was the formulation of a reformed system that would address
the developmental needs of the nation and create a healthy social
consciousness. The national policy on education laid down this
perspective as follows: "a radical reconstruction of education"
is essential for economic and cultural development of the country,
for national integration and for realizing the ideal of a socialistic
pattern of society. This will involve a transformation of a system
to relate to more closely to the life of the people; a continuous
effort to expand educational opportunity; a sustained and intensive
effort to raise the quality of education at all stages; an emphasis
on the development of science and technology; and the cultivation
of moral and social values. The educational system should produce
young men and women of character and ability committed to national
service and development. Only then will education be able to play
its vital role in promoting national progress, creating a sense
of common citizenship and culture, and strengthening national
integration. This is necessary if the country is to attain its
rightful place in the comity of nations in conformity with its
cultural heritage and its unique potentialities.
The search for an alternate system had a long
history, dating back to the early colonial times. The nostalgia
about the indigenous, as evident from the writings of many, including
Gandhi who described the pre-colonial system as a beautiful tree,
is a natural response to conditions of subjection. Yet, there
was no attempt to resurrect the pre-colonial or to adopt the traditional
as the ideal. Instead the concern of all those involved with educational
reform was to marry the traditional with the modern. A national
system of education which the colonial intellectuals and nationalist
leaders tried to evolve was based on a possible synthesis of all
that is advanced in the West with all that was abiding in the
traditional. In other words the national policy was not lodged
in a dichotomy between the indigenous and the western. The impact
of such a policy was the internalization of a universal outlook
and the location of the indigenous in the wider matrix of human
history. The educational policy adumbrated by independent India,
even if it faltered on many a count, was informed by an open-ended
view.
Recent Departures
The post-colonial system, in the assessment of
the present government, has an entirely different character. In
its view it continues to be colonial and western, producing an
intellectually and culturally alienated intelligentsia, derisively
called the "children of Macaulay". Given their education and training
and access to power, it is argued that they were able to exercise
an overriding influence in almost all spheres of society- political,
social and intellectual. The nature of political institutions
and developmental strategies of independent India were attributed
to their influence. The modern system of education, which they
tried to perpetuate, is anathema to the Sangh Parivar, as it is
not sufficiently "national" in content. The alternative proposed
by the Parivar and now being implemented by the government is
an indigenous system, which M.S. Golwalkar had earlier conceived
as religious in character, with emphasis on tradition, discipline
and military training. Romanticisation of traditional knowledge,
celebration of religious beliefs and emphasis on conformism are
its chief characteristics.
One of the major compulsions for changing the
content of education is the realization of the communal objective
of creating a Hindu national identity and national pride. An essay
on value education published by the National Council for Educational
Research and Training ( NCERT) suggests as follows: A sense of
belongingness must be developed in every individual learner by
focusing on Indias contribution to world civilization. It
is high time that Indias contribution in areas like mathematics,
sciences, maritime, medicine, trade, architecture, sculpture,
establishment of institutions of learning is emphasized and made
known to the learners to develop a sense of belonging to the nation
with respect and an attachment to the past.
In respect of both school and university education
the government agencies like the University Grants Commission
(UGC) and the NCERT are currently engaged in revising the curriculum
and bringing about a qualitative change in content. A discussion
document produced by the NCERT for curriculum development spells
out the main thrust of the contemplated change. The document dismisses
the existing system as colonial and western and in its place proposes
an indigenous curriculum, which would "celebrate the ideas of
native thinkers\" and "privilege the innovative experiments and
experiences emanated from its own context". The Document elaborates
the point as follows:
it may also be pointed out that there
is a need to bring to notice the contribution of India to
the world wisdom. Paradoxical as it may sound, while our children
know about Newton, they do know a computer they do not know
the concept of zero. Mention may also have to be made for
instance of Yoga and Yogic practices as well as Indian systems
of medicine like Ayurvedic and Unani forms which are being
recognized and practiced all over the world. The curriculum
will have to correct such imbalances.
The contrast between the western and the indigenous
and privileging the latter is a powerful political slogan capable
of arousing nationalist sentiments, but it hardly has any academic
worth. Not because indigenous system of knowledge need not be
integrated into the curriculum- in fact it is necessary to do
so more than what exists today- but the contrast between the two
systems as the NCERT document purports to do is likely to be counterproductive.
It would only create a false sense of pride, bordering on chauvinism,
which is detrimental to the pursuit of knowledge. What is required
is not information gathering which the NCERT is obsessed with,
but a creative integration of knowledge from different sources.
The system of school education that would emerge
out of the suggestions in this document is likely to have serious
long-term social implications. It would foster a generation incapable
of critically interrogating the problems of society or rationally
approach matters of social existence. Instead they will be more
inclined to accept the received wisdom and in the process miss
the significance of the revolution in knowledge currently taking
place in the world. The most undesirable consequence, however,
would be the creation of an intellectual and cultural situation
conducive for the onset of a conformist society.
Value Education
Considerable importance is attached in the new
scheme to value education, an issue that had attracted the attention
of educational planners from the very beginning. The value education
was generally perceived as a major input in the process of character
building of students as well as a means for the inculcation of
healthy social attitudes. In fact, there can hardly be any system
of education without the inculcation of values. What should constitute
the content of value education is however not easy to determine.
The different commissions had seriously deliberated upon this
and had suggested how moral, spiritual and religious ideas could
be incorporated in the curriculum. The Education Commission of
1964 took a clear view by underlining the importance of education
about religion and not religious education and significantly about
the need for the study of comparative religion. The Commission
also emphasized a universal outlook as the source of value education
so that the students become capable of comprehending the problems
of modern world. In 1970 the NCERT following a national conference
spelt out the content of value education. The values enunciated
were primarily secular in character: honesty, kindndess,charity,
tolerance, courtesy, compassion and sympathy. The present policy
seems to draw upon this tradition, but in actual practice marginalizing
the universal and comparative perspective so integral to the Indian
experience. In fact, the secular values the NCERT itself had earlier
enunciated do not get adequate attention in recent policy statements.
Therefore there is considerable apprehension that the much touted
value education would be restricted in due course to religious
instruction, and perhaps to Hindu religious instruction. The Director
of NCERT, though negatively, has forgrounded the religious dimension:
"The hesitation in delineating strategies for value inculcation
from religions through its various sources needs to be given up".
In fact, the textbooks prescribed in several states ruled by the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had long given up any such hesitation
and has prepared ample material not only to inculcate a religious
but a communal view of the world.
The scheme of value education is inextricably
linked with the communal cultural and political project. By its
very nature it would promote religiosity and religious consciousness
in society and help in redefining the nation in religious terms.
The Hindu religion oriented courses sponsored by the government
agencies and the religious interpretation of history serve the
same purpose. More so because they create a wedge in social consciousness.
Redefinition of the Nation
The restructuring of the education system undertaken
by the present government and the agencies under its control is
primarily oriented towards the redefinition of the nation in religious
terms. Using the logic of majoritarianism the nation is being
conceptualized as Hindu and a system of education to legitimize
this notion is being put in place. In this attempt the interpretation
of the past and the social consciousness emerging out of it are
of crucial importance, which explains the promotion of a hinduised
history by the Sangh Parivar. The soul of hinduisation, however,
is not the distortion of facts, which at any rate are aplenty,
but a religious interpretation of the past, which establishes
the right of the nation to the Hindus. Reminiscent of the colonial
view of the past, the communal history, which is now being propagated
by government institutions like the Indian Council for Historical
Research and increasingly finding place in school textbooks, depicts
Indian history as a record of continuous strife between religious
communities. In this interpretation all communities other than
the Hindus are identified as foreigners and therefore the enemies
of the nation. What is implied thereby is that Hindus alone has
a right to the nation. The recent attempts to prove the indigenous
origins of the Aryans and their vegetarianism are a part of establishing
historical legitimacy for Hindu nationhood. This however is only
the tip of the iceberg. A very concerted and well-planned attempt
is being made to create an alternate historical consciousness.
The channels of dissemination of this consciousness are not the
textbooks or the research projects sponsored by the ICHR alone,
but more so the vernacular pamphlets extensively distributed through
religious and social networks. They do not make any distinction
between myth and history; in fact they parade myth as history,
which in a way makes their reception easier. The history of Ramjanmabhoomi
circulated during the temple campaign is a good example.
The emphasis on the religious interpretation
of history is a reflection of a general shift from a secular perspective
to a religious orientation in education. The recent initiatives
taken by the Ministry of Human Resource Development, implemented
through the NCERT and the UGC, seek to impart a Hindu religious
character to the education system by incorporating in the curricula
areas of interest traditionally associated with religious practices.
The most glaring example of this tendency is the promotion of
a course in Karmakanda that would produce certified priests for
conducting rituals. Along with that attempts are afoot to open
new areas of study where, according to the NCERT, "scientific
evidence is not so far available to sustain some popular faith
and which have been rejected outright because of impatient and
motivated criticism". In pursuit of this Jyotir Vigyan, Jyotish
in popular parlance, is being introduced in Universities with
generous financial assistance from the UGC. The best of Indian
scientists have decried the wisdom behind this move, as the promotion
of such an unscientific field of study will only contribute to
obscurantism and superstition.
This initiative of the government raises an important
academic issue regarding the teaching of the traditional systems
of knowledge. That India like many other countries have an accumulated
wealth of knowledge needs no reiteration. In several fields like
medicine, plastic surgery, rhenoplasty, astronomy, town planning,
alchemy and so on Indians had attained a high level of excellence
at different points of time. They deserve to be studied and is
being studied as a part of the historical evolution of knowledge
in the field. But privileging them over the others, particularly
those without proper scientific foundation like Jyotish and Karmakanda,
is unaccademic and undesirable and is likely to encourage inward
looking and closed minds, particularly because the government
documents while emphasizing the contribution of Indian civilization
to other societies do not take notice of the impact of other civilisations
on India. Studying the state of knowledge in the past is one thing;
uncritically adopting it in the present curriculum is another.
The knowledge in each field has advanced so much, a return to
the past, however glorious it had been, is unrealistic and only
would drag the society into intellectual backwardness.
The Context
The change in the character of education from
the secular to the communal is taking place at a historical juncture
when transnational capital is tightening its stranglehold over
the Indian economy and society. The impact of this new phase of
imperialism, euphemistically called globalisation, thereby masking
its real nature and intent, is well pronounced. That the privatization
of education, particularly the withdrawal of the state from higher
education, occurring at a brisk pace in recent times is at the
instance of the World Bank is now well known. Not only steps are
afoot to set up private universities, but also several foreign
universities are vying with each other to set up their "extension
counters" in India. Given that the best of Indian universities
are starved of funds these institutions are likely to have a field
day. As for Indian universities they function today without even
the basic minimum facilities and with teachers who have no access
to the latest advances in their disciplines. These institutions
churn out students who complete their education as outcastes even
in their own chosen area of knowledge. What these institutions
offer is unacceptable to the fast growing affluent Indian middle
class. The situation is likely to aggravate in coming days with
the UGC reportedly being deprived of its funding functions and
the introduction of an accreditation system which would stamp
many an institution as academic slums without ever the possibility
of a honourable redemption. Understandably education is a fertile
land for investment, particularly if it comes with a foreign tag.
The response of the ruling classes and the present
government to this crisis is encoded in a report prepared by industrialists,
Mukesh Ambani and Kumaramangalam Birla, entitled A Policy Framework
for Reforms in Education, and submitted to the Prime Ministers
council on trade and industry. The brief of this young team of
industrialists is to formulate a policy framework for private
investment in education, health and rural development, which they
appear to have done with alacrity and enthusiasm. The proposals,
which they claim would usher in a revolution in education, in
fact, provide a blue print for the unconditional surrender to
the interests of advanced capitalist countries and for the preservation
of the existing privileges of the ruling classes. The revolution
proposed is the creation of a "competitive, yet co-operative,
knowledge based society". The prescription is as follows:
As the world moves on to forging an information
society founded on education, India cannot remain behind as
a non-competitive knowledge economy. India has to create an
environment that does not produce industrial workers and labourers
but fosters knowledge workers. Such people must be at the
cutting edge of knowledge workers and, in turn, placing India
in the vanguard in the information age.
This grand design is to be implemented through
direct foreign investment and privatization. It advocates "a full
cost recovery in higher education and encouraging the emergence
of a largely self-financing private sector". The rest, be it the
primary and secondary education or the liberal and performing
arts or "disciplines whose scholars do not command a market",
may be left to the patronage of the state. The unstated implication
of the scheme is that it would generate two streams: one for the
poor and the other for the elite. The education of the former
would be limited to literacy while the latter would be the receivers
of knowledge. But then the nature of the information society of
countries like India, as subordinate partners of advanced capitalist
countries, would be nothing better than that of a service sector.
Far from being competitive and innovative they are likely to be
destined to perform innumerable labour saving works for the benefit
of transnational capital. The most glaring example is the medical
transcription in which a large number of Indians, some of them
with high technical qualifications, are currently engaged in performing
the clerical work for American hospitals. Several other labour
saving "opportunities" are on the way. This is not to argue that
the opportunities opened up by information technology are to be
shunned, but to suggest its creative incorporation in the system
of education. At the same time it is necessary to recognize the
fact that the educational conditions created by information technology
are pregnant with the possibilities of intellectual colonization.
The breaking of the geographical barriers and communication restrictions
are indeed healthy attributes of knowledge dissemination, but
it cannot be divorced from the economic and political contexts
of knowledge production. The Ambani report, trapped in platitudes
and rhetoric, appears to be insensitive to these larger issues
inherent in the new information regime.
The over emphasis on information technology raises
yet another issue vital to the well being of society. The report
not only privileges technology education but also isolates and
marginalizes other areas. This is likely to affect adversely the
holistic character of education, so necessary for the creation
of a healthy society. An important attribute of knowledge production
is specialisation, but the absence of a liberal content in it
devalues education into mere training. The early educational planners
were quite conscious of this danger and therefore took care to
integrate liberal and social science education with science and
technology. The humanity and social science faculties of the Indian
Institutes of Technology emerged out of this perspective. It is
for the same reason that universities devoted to the pursuit of
science and technology took care to nurture social science faculties.
Interestingly a vice-chancellor who made major contribution to
the planning and development of a university for science and technology
in Kerala was a social scientist.
In recent times two tendencies counter to this
liberal spirit has been gaining ground in the organization of
higher education. The first is the establishment of single subject
oriented universities and second, the marginalisation, if not
the elimination, of liberal subjects from the curriculum. The
former leads to an extremely lopsided university system in which
the possibilities of academic enrichment through interdisciplinary
teaching and research become minimal. Such universities do not
rise above the level of institutes. The latter is more unfortunate.
With the onset of cyber age education and privatization social
sciences and such other "unproductive disciplines" appears to
be on their way out. In some states like Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu
liberal education is at a discount and the time and money allotted
for social science subjects are being diverted for training in
information technology. The NCERT, it is reported, is in the process
of eliminating history from the school curriculum as a distinct
subject of study. The Ambani report locates this shift in the
context of globalisation and the imperatives of a market-led,
knowledge- based economy. The report puts forward the logic as
follows:
"It is important that skills, as a result
of education, have economic value beyond their intrinsic merit.
Equally it is important that there is diversity in order to
avoid abundance in any one skill and consequent poor rewards.
To illustrate, although computer skills are valuable, if too
many computer specialists are produced, rewards for them will
be weak".
Lacking a philosophy of education the Report
is not able to see beyond this pragmatic problem and recognize
that the system it is advocating will not only widen the educational
disparities in society but also would undermine the basic quality
of education. If Ambanis scheme is implemented the fundamental
purpose of education, namely, the refinement of mind is going
to be the main casualty.
Yet another dimension of liberal education is
its ability to sensitise the social and political rights. This
was understood and recognized even by the Education Commission
set up by the British government under the chairmanship of W.W.Hunter
in 1882. The Commission had then advocated the desirability of
a shift in policy in favour of technical education, interestingly,
at a time when there was hardly any industry in India. The rationale
for the change was that the liberal education was making the Indians
conscious of their political rights leading to their participation
in public movement. The Commission foretold the oppositional role
the educated intelligentsia would play even before the storm broke
out. Similarly the educational thinking and planning of the ruling
classes today is to undermine the liberal education in order to
rule out any possible dissent and protest. This is an interest
equally shared by the forces of fundamentalism and globalisation.
The Ambani Report reflects this interest in ample
measure. Apparently it aims to create "a new information society,
resplendent with knowledge, research, creativity and innovation".
But in reality it is concerned with the creation of necessary
conditions for the operation of the national and trans-national
capital. The Indian social scene has been rather turbulent during
the last two decades when protest movements from different social
groups have become quite pronounced. The educational campuses
have been particularly vulnerable. The Report therefore suggests
steps to ensure peaceful campuses without agitations and protests.
Towards that end all educational institutions are to be made apolitical
by preventing the "advertent or inadvertent creeping in of various
isms" and by banning through legislation "any form of political
activity on the campuses of universities and educational institutions".
The aim of such a move is to usher in a conformist society in
which alone fundamentalism can thrive and transnational capital
can operate successfully. Thus in the new educational initiatives
of the government there is a convergence of interests of both
communalism and globalisation.
Except in certain pockets like Kerala and West
Bengal there is hardly any awareness, let alone initiatives, for
organising resistance against the onslaught of these two forces
in the field of education. Most of the struggles for democratic
rights in educational institutions are not sensitive to the imminent
threat to the liberal and secular education. Given the rather
dismal democratic climate in our institutions, they are more concerned
with collective bargaining for improved conditions of work and
better career opportunities. A search for an alternative has not
yet begun in our society. A large section of the Indian intelligentsia
are either lost in the ideological delusion of globalisation or
scared by the aggressive posturing of communalism. The solution
perhaps lies in the organization of a counter cultural movement-
counter both to communalism and globalisation- since the cultural
domain as a whole is under siege. The movement has to posit an
alternative as well as counter the initiatives. Education is an
area in which both these can be creatively attempted, drawing
upon the earlier efforts to formulate a national and modern system
of education.