Sequel of an illustrious saga
The educational scenario in India is as old as the civilization itself. From the dawn of the early Vedic civilization education has been given the highest esteem and as a result the men of letters get the highest respect in the society. This scenario also brought to the fore the emergence of internationally acclaimed universities in the ancient age, the most significant of which were Nalanda and Varanasi (Benares). While Nalanda was well known for its system of residential university, mode of education, world famous library consisting of meticulous copies of texts, Varanasi was the seat of learning of Sanskrit. For this reason both of them attracted, even in those days, students from around the world like Korea, Japan, China, Tibet, Indonesia, Persia and Turkey.
The journey of modern India after its independence in 1947 commenced with this illustirous legacy of education. From the very beginning the government declared of opening schools for all irrespective of religion, caste, class, sex and creed. This urge was also found in the domain of higher education and governmental encouragement led to the opening of new educational institutions throughout india. However, since India is still a developing nation, lots of discrepancies are there and therefore has to struggle with the challenges in its primary education and endeavor to reach 100% literacy. It’s to be noted that in the Indian society there is still the ominous presence of illiteracy. Although it is being dared by the government the overall result is not satisfactory.
The situation is serious in respect of Universal Compulsory Primary Education. The entire system has to deal with several challenges. The first and foremost of them is to keep the poor children in schools and maintain quality of education in rural areas. All of the states are miles away from this target other than Kerala, which is a notable exception.
Throughout the country all levels of educaction, ranging from the primary to higher education, are under the supervision of the Ministry of Human Resource Development that includes Department of Higher Education (India) and Department of School Education and Literacy. It is true that development of the standard of education nationwide has always been on the agneda of the Union Government and for this reason it is heavily subsidized. Nowdays, the government is mulling over the concept of making higher education partially self-financing. This has triggered a naitonal debate and is still under connsideration.
India has truly progeressed a lot in terms of general education in the last sixty years.
