 APPENDIX N-
PROPOSAL TO CONSIDER FURTHER THE
 RECOMMENDATIONS OF UNIVERSITY
 EDUCATION COMMISSION PERTAINING
 TO HIGHER EDUCATION WITH SPECIAL
 REFERENCE TO THE REQUIREMENTS
 OF RURAL AREAS (MEMO BY BIHAR
 GOVT.)

In its 17th meeting held in April last the Central Advisory Board of Education gave its approval to the recommendations of the University Education Commission regarding Rural Universities contained in Chapter XVIII. The Bihar Government in its memorandum on these recommendations while expressing its agreement on the general principles behind the recommendation for the establishment of Rural Universities considered it neither feasible nor desirable to set up independent and exclusive Rural Universities at least in the immediate future. The Bihar Government has already When steps to integrate Basic Education with non-Basic Education at the Primary stage so that eventually Basic Education may assimilate the entire education system up to the middle standard. The Bihar Government, is of the view that this process of integration has the advantage of transforming the orthodox system of education to one more suited to the requirements of our country. That a prerequisite of such a transformation is the establishment of a few institutions of a new type which may act as a model, is readily recognised and is also borne out by the experience in Bihar where certain Basic Schools were given a trial for a period of 10 years before the State launched upon a programme of expansion. In that view of the matter the establishment of Rural Colleges (which would in Bihar be the culmination of the new system tried in earlier stages), would be highly desirable. The first Rural College has already been started in Bihar near Muzaffarpur, though primarily for the purposes of training of teachers.

2. If, however, such Rural Colleges instead of being recognised by and affiliated to the existing Universities, are to be part of a new entity to be called the Rural University there will be a serious danger, in the present psychological environment of our country of such universities being considered academically inferior bodies and their products suffering as a result of this inescapable prejudice. It is, therefore, necessary that the graduates of such Rural Colleges should not get degrees or diplomas from different institutions, While the courses and the method of study in the Rural Colleges will be different, the level of their academic achievements should be the same if not higher than that in an orthodox type of college. It is, therefore, proposed that the Central Advisory Board of Education should recommend the opening of Rural Colleges or the conversion of some other colleges into Rural Colleges in the rural setting with special courses, affiliated to the existing Universities which should themselves be re-organised so as to provide, for a more practical work (laboratory-and field work in all subjects) touching urban and rural life and requirements. A proper integration and correlation between the needs of urban and rural areas is much more desirable than dividing institutions into separate blocks or categories.

3. The grounds on which this suggestion is made can be summarised as below : ---

(a) Rural institutions will be distinguished by a new method of imparting knowledge through crafts and practical work and by the rural environments. The " target" of scholarship for the

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best students will not be inferior to that of an orthodox institution. Therefore the students should be eligible for the same degrees and diplomas which are conferred by existing Universities ;

(b) If a Rural University becomes an exclusive body as recommended by the Commission, the students of that territory may have a grievance that they are being deprived,of the benefits (if any) of the general type of, education ;

(c) For service competitive examinations and " white- collar " professions, the products of the Rural Colleges should have as much opportunity as those of the old type of institutions. This may not be possible at least in the beginning if their degrees are different from those of others. As 86 per cent of the population lives in rural surroundings, the objects should be to give a rural practical bias to all the existing institutions. This can only be possible if the new colleges remain part of the old Universities.

(d) The courses of the existing Universities should be so recognised as to include specialisation in subjects pertaining to the requirements of both rural and urban areas with necessary practical work in suitable surroundings.

4. The Bihar Government would, therefore, propose that a Committee may be set up either by the Central Advisory Board of Education or the Inter University Board to suggest changes in the syllabii and curricula of the existing Universities in such a way as to meet requirements of both rural and urban life and to accommodate rural colleges as and when they are established and to make it possible for their students to obtain the same degrees as their brethren of the urban colleges and oil same and equal terms.

APPENDIX N- PROPOSAL TO CONSIDER FURTHER THE RECOMMENDATIONS OF UNIVERSITY EDUCATION COMMISSION PERTAINING TO HIGHER EDUCATION WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE REQUIREMENTS OF RURAL AREAS (MEMO BY BIHAR GOVT.)