From Education Commission to Knowledge Commission, India has traversed a long distance. The shift of paradigm should be substantive in terms of content and focus. While education for long has been concerned with pedagogy, knowledge is more empirical and should emphasise on development of skill and capacity building. Our emphasis on education has led only to the mushrooming growth of universities, colleges and schools — creating a large reservoir of unemployable graduates and post-graduates.
Like many areas of our life, education did not have a thoughtful and proactive policy. The super structure of our economy with expanding industry and business has to be based on the infrastructure of a knowledge base. The Macualeyan education system, which we instituted and carried forward in post-Independence India created millions of degree holders. While nobody can belittle the importance of literacy, our obsessive pre-occupation with degree-led education has done more harm to our society, polity and economy than good.
The question is whether or not we should have a multi-tier system of education. Those desirous of not pursuing higher education and going for a job should stop after PlusTwo or graduation. The quality of education has to be world class.
It is generally agreed that while the standard of school education in India, particularly in urban centres with an emphasis on mathematics, science and English is better than what is available abroad, the standard of higher education in colleges and universities leave much to be desired. No wonder that a study undertaken by McKinsy sometime ago concluded that only one-third of our university graduates are employable. Experts candidly admit that higher education is a sick child of education and that it is not serving the cause of Indian youth. They further say that the academic world needs to come to terms with today’s reality and the 11th Plan gives us enough elbowroom to experiment.
It is a pity that a country of India’s size and stature has only the IITs, IIMs and IIC or JNU which find mention in reports cataloguing the best universities and educational institutions in the world. The need of the hour is that we should have many Nalandas of yore, rather than mushrooming growth of educational institutions, including engineering colleges without proper infrastructure and faculty.
It is high time that serious attention is paid to stem the rot and salvage the decadent and moribund educational system in the country. Realising the abysmal standard of research in universities, it is heartening and reassuring that the government is giving final shape to Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research (INSPIRE) to rejuvenate research in universities and academies.
The scheme, being finalised by the Planning Commission and Science and Technology Ministry for the 11th Five Year Plan, aims to tackle the problem of exodus by creating lucrative opportunities in science and technology and encouraging students to choose the science stream. The stream of social sciences also needs to be further revised so as to cope up with changing needs of the time. Understanding the social and political processes are too important to be left to the social scientist alone, engineering and management graduates too should be conversant with them to discharge their responsibilities in an effective and meaningful way.
