`Secondly, it is equally a more serious problem. Ours is an agricultural society; 80 per cent of our people are on the farms. What is happening today? We give a boy education; he leaves the farm and wants to go to the towns to get a white-collared job. The result is: the parents say that instead of education doing any good to

him he has lost his children to the farm which need hands in culti- vating the lands. Therefore, our secondary education must be reori- ented; reoriented to make the boys work on the farms and not to go to cities; reoriented towards `getting better production. We must have boys who produce more; who knows how to use his hands and to realise the dignity of labour. Again this is a big task. But that is how we have to work as far as secondary education is concerned. In secondary education we must have intensive and extensive teacher training. If we need trained teachers in primary education it is infinitely more important that we have proper `teachers in secondary education and we are doing a great deal in that regard.

`The next aspect of the quality which I would like to emphasise is the university education. Here again we find about 2500 colleges in India and the standards are very uneven. Some colleges are very good and some are very bad. This has got to change. University is the same thing. We do not want to soar the number of universities. We want to consolidate and strengthen the universities that already exist. Of course, in a large country like India, when there is great demand for higher education, some universities have to be started. But we should be very chary in starting new universities. We must be absolutely certain that the universities to be established will maintain highest standard. I was assured myself by the Chief Mini- ster, before I committed myself to start Bangalore University, that it will maintain the highest standards of university education.

`Then we have to deal with postgraduate departments. These are, if I may so call, the nurseries for future studies-scientists, doc- tors, educationists and leaders in our country. They really constitu- te the cream of the educational world. The standards of education can only be judged by the standards the post-graduate departments have reached. Therefore, we have to give full support to our postgraduate departments and I am very glad that Dr. Kothari with the imagination he possesses, has started a new scheme called Science Talent Projects. It is doing a very good work. The scheme he is doing is to find out faculties in different universities and strengthen these faculties to the utmost. The intention being that in faculty you get best teachers and best students all over India and that faculty should have such high standard that it can compare with the highest standards obtaining anywhere in the world.

`Then, may I say a few words about science? I said something yesterday but I think this is a different audience, and I must repeat what I said yesterday, that without proper education in science, pro- gress is impossible in this country. We are living in a scientific and technological world and, therefore, our boys and girls must be steeped in science. We cannot afford postponing teaching of science till they reach higher secondary education or university. When I think of my own study, I am horrified to find how little I know of science; how little was taught to me about science. I knew about Shakespeare or Milton and I knew the history of other countries than my own country, and the history of my country was so badly written. I hardly knew about the happenings in the world outside my country, and the phenomenal advance the science has, made. That was many years ago. Today science is advancing so fast that we must bring

up our boys and girls to realise the great adventure that is taking place, how science is forging ahead. As I said yesterday, we want to start teaching science even in the elementary schools. We want to teach elementary principle of science and gradually to take it up in the secondary and university education. In this respect, I will just mention in passing, that we have now started a pilot project to teach science in Delhi. It is so successful that we are extending it all over India. The project envisages picking out many bright scientists at the school level giving them scholarship and train them upto M.Sc. or even Doctorate level. We are increasing the number of scholarships very fast so that we will be able to build up in the next ten years and we will have a body of bright scientists in our country.

`I should like to say a word about the teachers and their salaries. Many deputations have waited upon me to represent grievances of teachers. A number of deputations have waited on me and the number may run to some hundreds. Almost every week 1 get a tele- gram from some State syaing that something must be done about the salaries of teachers and they want to go and wait on deputation. The grievance is that they are paid differently in Government schools and private aided schools; there is no security ; no triple benefit. The fact that in some States the salaries are so low that I fail to see how any human being can exist leave aside the teacher. There was a time, ladies and gentlemen, when we had great respect for our teachers. We know from Manu that teacher was not supposed to have salary; he only got Dakshina. We do not give status and give them Dakshina. I agree that we are a poor country and we cannot afford to give our teachers, the salaries, that countries like U.S.A. or U.K. give. Though industry pays them better price they take to this. Let me say a word about the United States. I have come across a brilliant man, who, can command any salary in the industrial market, had taken to the profession of teaching. I have talked to one of them and asked why he had done so? He said because this is a great challenge to mould the future of young men and to meet that great challenge. It is a sense of dedication that makes them to take to education and not any monetary considerations.

`My appeal to teachers from this platform is: they must have a sense of dedicaion. They must realise the greatest challenge that we are facing today of the education of the young. They can face that challenge. But, at the same time I want to tell the State Gov- ernments: "you cannot expect teachers to teach children while they are starving". You must at least give them a bare minimum of comfort. If you give that I am sure, our teachers have sufficient sense of devotion and dedication not to expect the salary comensure to what they get in the free market or in industries.

`Then, I should,like to say a word about the participation of the people in education. In no country in the world can the educational problem be solved by Government alone. Government have not the resources, have not the means. It is the people, the public that must be aroused to the conscience of education and they must participate in various educational schemes. Let me give one or two

instances. Look at the school improvement programmes. What wonders Madras is achieving and Mysore is following the foot steps. I was talking to the Chief Minister of Madras and he explained how in each village a committee is set up which goes to the schools and finds out what improvement it needs. Look at the mid-day meal. This is all due to participation of the people. Look at what is happening in Maharashtra. We talk of adult literacy. I am convinced that we will be never able to solve this problem unless there is a tremendous participation of the people, unless we arouse the people to a sense of shame that there are millions of illiterates in our country. See in Maharashtra : There is a village there; the children go to the school, come back home and teach their parents what they learnt in their school. The same lesson is repeated by them to the aged mother and father. It does not cost the State a single anna. When the whole village is literate, there is a ceremony and they get an award not a monetory award but when the Minister goes there, there is a gathering and there is applause and cheers. This is what I mean by participation of the people. I know in the city of Bombay, we have voluntary organisations that are working for the removal of adult illiteracy. You may set up public committees, voluntary organisations. That is the only way that you can tackle this problem.

`In passing, I may mention the fact that we have set up an Education Commission as you might have seen in the papers, and we hope, that the Commission which is under the able Chairmanship of Dr. Kothari-a great educationist and a great scientist-will produce results which will be of help to the whole educational world of India.

`Now, I would like to say a word about language. It is a con- troversial subject, it is an explosive subject. But, I am one of those who do not believe in the policy of ostrich ; I do not want to put my head in the sand and say everything is alright. We have to face and solve this problem. It is no use pretending that the language question has been finally solved. Now, there are two aspects of the language problem to which I would like to refer.

`The first is concerning the schools. We are now supposed to be working: the three language formula and we are solemnly told that three language formula has been accepted; everybody is happy; everybody is happy in the world and God is in the Heaven. May I draw your attention to what the three language formula was? At the meeting in the Central Advisory Board of Education, which was held in 1956, this three language formula was recommended-the mother tongue in the regional language, English and Hindi, no doubt a modern Indian language. When the matter went before the Chief Ministers' Conference in 1961, there was a material change. I do not know whether it was due to inadvertence or it was deliberate. Now, the three language formula contemplates Hindi, the mother tongue and any other Indian language; not modern Indian language but any other Indian language. The result is, in the North what is taught in schools is Hindi, of course the mother tongue, English and Sanskrit. And my friends in the South say that it is not a compliance with the three language formula. We are teaching our boys Hindi and they must do a special Indian language. The

Chief Minister agreed that we must teach any other Indian language. If you see the Eighth Schedule of the (Indian Constitution, Sanskrit is mentioned as an Indian language. Of course, it is an Indian lan- guage. It complies with the three language formula in which it was conceived. Look at the other problem; look at the scripts not only in the South but in the North; the Nagri script, the Roman script and the Sanskrit script. I can understand the mother tongue. I have never heard of the mother script. Nobody writes in his script at his mother's knee. He talks to his mother in the mother's language. Script is something artificial, something evolved because of the needs and necessities of language. Therefore, we must give close thought to the script in our educational programme.

`Then, comes the question of the Universities. It is even a more serious problem. Medium of instruction in many Universities still continues to be English. Some are switching over to the regional languages. Where the medium continues to be English, the difficulty experienced is that the boys that come from secondary schools that have been taught in the mother tongue find the difficulty in follow- ing the lecturers. Therefore, some States very wisely give intensive studies in English one year university course, two years university course, before they go to the Universities so that they can follow the teaching. But, there is change-over in the pre-universities. Have we understood the implications of that fact? We have fourteen languages, and if our graduates of the future, our academicians and scholars of the future, are taught in fourteen different languages, then no Conference in India would be possible unless we have fourteen interpreters to interpret the fourteen different languages which are spoken. These conferences would be impossible without interpreters. Why is it you are listening and carrying on our discussions later on? Because we speak in one language. Whether it is Hindi or whether it is English, the necessity of one language is a great unifying force in India, in the world of scholarship, in the world of Universities, in the world of judiciary cannot be too much emphasised. And if we break India into different regional languages without taking necessary action to have a unifying language, we will be running great risks of India becoming-producing a sort of linguistic chaos. I am told other countries have solved this problem. Why cannot India? The only country that I know of which has comparable problems to ours, is Russia, where they have 16 republics and 16 States and there are other languages also besides, the languages taught in the State. I am told in all there are 50 languages. But and this is a very important `but', while they support fully, the different languages of the Republics, everybody learns one common language which is Russian which acts as a unifying factor in the U.S.S.R. What is happening in the new African countries? Many of them have accepted English. I think Nigeria has done it. Because, there are too many languages, the only unifying force for the time being can be the English language. Therefore, what I appeal to our educationists is to bear in mind these two aspects of the language problem. The importance of enriching and improving our regional languages and at the same time having at our disposal a language which will unify us cannot be ignored. So far English has played that role. Whether it should continue to play that role or whether Hindi can take its place is another matter. But we must fully realise the implications of pushing ahead with regional languages in the

universities without at the same time providing a link-language which will bind us all over the country. That is the exclusive subject and I am very glad to pass it on to somebody else than myself. I am going to ask the Commission which is just appointed under the Chairmanship of Dr. Kothari, to consider this question and give us an answer to this problem, because I think this is one of the most important problems that we have to decide if we are to go ahead with our educational progress.

`One thing more which is also controversial which I must mention. That is the question of education being made a concurrent subject. All of you have seen the Sapru Committee Report which has strongly recommended that university and higher education should be a concurrent subject. I know the prejudice, that is against the States' handing over to us, part of their power ! The Chief Minister will kindly forgive me for using that expression. But if we are going to have a national pattern of education, if you are going to have a national education, if we really believe in what we say, is it not obvious that national policy must be laid down on a uniform basis from the Centre? What does concurrent subject mean? I have heard even educated people telling me, how can you deprive the States of this power? Concurrent subject does not mean to deprive the States of their power to legislate or administer education. We are not suggesting that education should become exclusive by a Union subject. `Concurrent subject' means-I think it is not necessary to go to the fundamentals or elementary things here-it means that both the Union and States should have power to legislate with regard to education. And I assure you that the Union will be most loathe to interfere unless there is a grave provocation or there is great need to interfere. Therefore, I would beg of the States-the Sapru Committee Report, I think is circulated-to bear in mind, how important it is at least in the sphere of education-I am not talking of school education- there should be a national policy, which should be laid down at the Centre if necessary.

`The next question is, about All India Education Service. I am sorry that four States have not agreed to the formation of the All India Education Service. Education Ministers of these four States are here and I hope before they part from the salubrious climate of Bangalore, they will tell me that they are agreed. Under the Con- stitution, I can introduce the subject in the Rajya Sabha tomorrow and get 2/3rd majority and then send it to States. But I shall feel happier and much more proud if I can tell the Rajya sabha that every State in India has agreed to the formation of the All India Education Service. After all, you have the I.A.S., you have the All India Forest Service, and you have the Indian Medical Service. What is the prejudice against All India Education Service? It will also help the national integration in education.

One last word before I close my rather too long a speech-that is textbooks. I have been hearing greatly about the abuse that almost goes with the expression `text books' and we have got to do something about it. Text-books are most important because we try for the first- time to impress upon the juvenile mind. The boy or girl who goes to school much depends upon what textbooks he or she reads. I have heard text-books which do not contain correct

facts; I have seen text-books which are a disgrace to history I have seen textbooks, where there are spelling mistakes. Therefore, we have taken up a scheme in Delhi to produce national textbooks on most important subjects which would be sent to the States, and I hope the States will translate them into the regional languages and introduce them in schools. At least in that aspect, we should have a common national uniform policy.

`Ladies and gentlemen, I apologise for this very long speech. But education is an important and difficult subject with many facets and many aspects. I assure you, I have tried to deal with it as briefly as possible. I hope the formal meeting which will start after this inaugural ceremony will be a very useful and important one and we will have produced results.

`Before I sit down, may I thank my friend the Hon'ble Chief Minister of Mysore for inviting this Board to Bangalore. Mysoreans are famous, of course. They have many qualities. But for the time being, I only emphasise the quality of hospitality. We are grateful to them for the way they have looked after the delegates. We are grateful for the hospitality, and we hope, the name of Bangalore will be associated with some of the most important decisions in the world of education.

Thank you."