 GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

Condolence Resolution

Before taking up the agenda, the Chairman referred to the Sad demise of Dr. B.N. Prasad. He said :

During the last year, we had the misfortune of losing Dr. B. N. Prasad, Chairman of the Commission for Scientific and Technical Terminology and member of the Board who had died at Dhanbad (Bihar) on November 9, 1967. Dr. Prasad was born on 13-9-1905 and educated at Patna and London. For several Years, he served as Professor and Head of the Department of Hindi in Patna University. Later he worked as Professor of Linguistics at the Deccan College, Poona; Director, K. M. Institute of Hindi Studies and Linguistics at Agra; and as Director of the Central Hindi Directorate, Ministry of Education, New Delhi.

He was a great linguist of international repute, and was associated with the work of evaluation and standardisation of scientific and technical terminology ever since the work began under the Government of India. He was a great scholar of Hindi and Sanskrit and his contribution in these subjects will be ever remembered. He has scores of published works to his credit. Notable among his publications are a collection of poems entitled 'Moti ke Dane', 'Vedon ki Pramanikta ka Rahasya', 'Anekta mein Ekta', 'Rashtrabhasha mein Paribhashik Shabdon ki Samasya'. He also edited a number of old manuscripts and his monumental work on phonetics is in press. In his death, the Board has lost one of the country's eminent scholars.

May I request you to stand up in silence for a minute to revere his memory?

The members stood in silence and adopted the condolence resolution.

ITEM 1

To record appreciation of the services rendered by those who have ceased to be members of the Board since the last meeting and to welcome new mem- bers.

The Board recorded its appreciation of the services of the following persons who had ceased to be members of the Board after the last session:

1. Shri Prem Kirpal

2. Air Vice-Marshal S. N. Goyal

3. Shri S. Rajaraman

4. Dr. K. N. Rao

5. Shri G. V. Sapre

6. Dr. Gopal Singh

7. Dr. Mohan Sinha Mehta

8. Dr. Vikram A. Sarabhai

The first five persons were ex-officio members and the changes were due to retirement or transfer. The term of membership of Dr. Gopal Singh, M. P., came to an end after he completed his full term of three years. Dr. Mohan Sinha Mehta and Dr. Vikram Sarabhai had served two consecutive terms on the Board.

The Board also extended a hearty welcome to the following eleven new members who were appointed to the Board during the current year:

1. Rear Admiral R. N. Batra I. N.

2. Shri K.C. Chacko

3. Shri G. K. Chandiramani

4. Dr. P. K. Duraiswamy

5. D. R. M. Kasliwal

6. Prof. P. J. Madan

7. Dr. S. Misra

8. Dr. B. D. Nag Chaudhuri

9. Prof. T. S. Sadasivan

10. Dr. B. R. Saksena

11. Shri K. P. Subramania Menon, M. P.

ITEM 2

To report that proceedings-of the thirty-third meeting of the Central Advisory Board of Education held at New Delhi in August 1967 were sent to the State Governments and Union Territories.

The Board noted the action taken.

The other items on the agenda fell under three main heads (Annexure III).

(a) Items relating to the Fourth Five Year Plan;

(b) Items relating to the National Policy on Education; and

The memoranda and notes on these items are in Part II of the Proceedings, which will be published as a separate volume.

The Board devoted the first two sessions to a general discussion on these three items. During the third session, the Board divided itself into three committees (Annexures IV, V and VI) to examine in detail the implementation of these programmes, and in the last plenary session of the Board the recommendations of the three committees were discussed and resolutions adopted.

ITEM 3

To discuss the Fourth Five Year Plan in Education.

Dr. B. D. Nag Chaudhuri

Dr. Nag Chaudhuri, Member (Education), Planning Commission, initiating the discussion on the subject, said that the educational Plan of a country, as large and diverse as ours, should reflect the local needs and problems as well as the overall national priorities. Ideally, therefore a plan was the result of an effective dialogue between the Centre and. the States. The Planning Commission and the Ministry of Education had tried in some measures, limited as they were by time to discuss and consult State Education Departments in evolving the national plan for education.

A Planning Group was set up to take up the task of formulating the plan and its financial and other implications. The Planning Group set up a Steering Committee under the chairmanship of the Education Secretary of the Union Ministry. The Steering Committee had been asked to formulate proposals for a plan of approximately the same size as provided in the earlier draft and also to take into account the various developments that had occurred during the last three annual years such as the report of the Education Commission, and the National Policy on Education issued by the Central Government, in considering and formulating the plan proposals. The Union Education Minister had referred to the proposals of the Steering Committee in his remarks and also indicated some of the national priorities that had been taken into account in formulating these proposals, The Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission had also referred to some of the difficulties, human and administrative. A certain amount of flexibility in organisation and administration is necessary to allow for experimentation and for the exercise of individual and collective initiative. The expansion of educational facilities and large variety of new ideas and techniques that had been introduced in recent years had created at the same time both opportunities and difficulties in our institutions and many of them had not yet been communicated fully or adequately to educational experts.

The last 18 years have witnessed phenomenal expansion in educational facilities in the country at all stages of education, general as well as technical. While facilities have been expanding in this manner, there have been serious deficiencies in regard to buildings, equipment, textbooks and the effective linking of the demands of the economy with the supply of the educational system. This has given rise to problems of education on the one hand and of shortage on the other. Problems of wastage and drop-outs have also been noticeable at all levels. While

resources are important in education, their effective utilisation is even more important. The new plan proposals try to reflect the economic objectives of educational development, the effort to ensure equality in education and reduction of. wastage, and the development and adoption of techniques more suitable to our system.

As regards priorities, the Committee has identified the rapid expansion of primary education and the provision of universal primary education, especially in backward areas. At the same time the rate of drop-outs and failures at the primary stage is a matter of very serious concern and one of our first efforts should be to reduce this drain on our slender resources. Another priority is the expansion and improvement of science education at all levels including research. Efforts for quality improvement, adjustment of professional and vocational education to manpower needs, educational research, well- designed and carefully conducted experimentation and pilot projects, are also contemplated in order to increase the efficiency of the entire educational system. The development of part-time education and correspondence courses are extremely important features in a de- mocratic society.

As regards the strategy, great emphasis has been placed on mobilising local resources, utilising to the maximum the existing facilities, and plugging leakages at all stages. These attempts would contribute considerably to increase the over-all efficiency. In order to achieve this objective, it will be necessary to streamline the planning, implementation and evaluation machinery. Every new scheme should be taken up only after careful consideration and adequate preparation through experimentation and pilot projects, before it is applied on a large scale. It is hoped that in the new plan, priority will be given to such activities as do not require much finance but which have a large multiplier effect or where the human component is adequately taken into account. These efforts will need skill of organisation and technical competence and a Much larger human effort from the administrative machinery as well as from the teachers. Edu- cational technology which promotes expansion and development of education with minimum investment and without lowering the standards will have to be discovered and used in increasing measure. The educational programmes thus taken up will have to be assessed in the light of their social and economic objectives. Above all we require a great deal of coordination not only between the Education Department and the whole teaching machinery but also between various departments of the State, between State Departments of Education and the Central Ministry and also between expert bodies such as State Institutes of

Education, the Departments of Education and the National Council for Educational Research and Training.

The approach to the new Fourth Plan lays emphasis on, the adoption of the shift system in classes I and II and the raising of the teacher-pupil ratio to 1 : 40 or 1 : 45. The children of this age cannot sit for long hours in school, and instruction for two to three hours under direct supervision is more effective than sitting in the classroom for longer hours. This will effect saving and also bring in more children without burdening the teacher with large classes. It will improve teacher-pupil contact and this will, in turn, help to reduce drop-outs. The teacher would be remunerated suitably for the longer hours of work. The shift system will thus improve the efficiency of the elementary stage and lower the rate of wastage and stagnation. The resources saved through the adoption of the shift system can be ploughed back into primary education for giving better emoluments to teachers and improving teaching facilities.

While we are doing our best to provide more and better education to students, we should also ensure that students who receive this education discharge a certain responsibility to the community. How this can be done is a point for consideration. Educational expenditure has been increased at almost double the rate of national income. The educated community, therefore, is a favoured section of the population and it is their duty to help the less fortunate fellow citizens by rendering the necessary assistance.

Problems of student unrest, unemployment, etc., also require a serious consideration. I would seek the advice of members on these issues which are closely related to the problems of education.

In the discussion that followed, members made the following observations.

Education Minister, Andhra Pradesh:

Three statistical landmarks stand out from the Union Minister's speech : first, that a reasonable assessment of expenditure required for a really effective Fourth Plan is of the order of Rs. 1,600 crore: secondly, what has been actually worked out is of the order of Rs. 1,300 crore; and thirdly, the writing on the wall is that it will be further cut down to about Rs. 900 crore. This means that the States will have to cut down their plans by about 40 to 45 per cent. This is a very disquieting feature because, in the light of this reduction, most of the programmes and suggestions contained in these papers become only of academic interest. Even a simple proposition like providing schooling facilities for the primary stage means the supply of a large number

of teachers and the provision of money. Under such reduced resources, therefore, it would be more practicable to pin-point those essential programmes that have to be maintained and postpone others to better times. The Board could suggest two or three alternative sets of programmes out of which each State could select those which suited it best and which could be implemented within the available resources, cutting down its plan to size.

Shri J. M. Lobo Prabhu, M.P.

It has been stated in the agenda papers that the States of Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh account for 48 per cent of the students who are not enrolled. It is a point for enquiry whether these States are not lagging behind because of Hindi. The phenomenon of drop-outs is also seen to follow the same pattern. The reason for this situation needs to be studied and definite conclusions reached.

It has been stated that about 40 per cent of teachers are untrained. Under these circumstances, there seems very little point in launching a big-sized programme of teaching science in schools, especially when there is shortage of teachers and equipment. It seems a wastage of public funds, and of students' time and talent.

As regards Basic education, it has been stated that the per- centage of children in Basic schools has increased from 15.1 to 26. In the first place an evaluation should be made of the system vis-a-vis the ordinary system. In actual practice, it is. the rural and poorer sections of the population that are condemned to Basic education. In the absence of such an evaluation, it is not proper to continue to spend government revenues on a system of education which has failed.

On the question of reducing wastage and stagnation, perhaps an effective remedy would be to apply the law of compulsion to the pupil who is enrolled rather than to the pupil who is not enrolled. Once the child is enrolled, the law should see to it that he does complete his education and the parents should be penalized if they withdraw the children prematurely.

Smt. Durgabai Deshmukh :

Even if the resources are reduced to Rs. 900 crore, it should be possible to achieve what we want if the programmes are intelligently and wisely planned. It is obvious that both expansion and qualitative improvement will have to be met within these resources. Qualitative expansion should really be for the purpose of meeting unavoidable social demands and needs. Under this category would fall the education of girls.

For, out of those that remain outside school, nearly 60 per cent are girls, and the gap between boys' and girls' education is still very wide. The pace of girls" education needs to be accelerated.

A great deal more has to be done to mobilise community resources and effort. The history of the development of education is largely an account of private enterprise. There is, therefore, urgent need to make a detailed study and correct assessment of the magnitude and the kind of voluntary effort already available the distribution of its spheres of activity, and the allocation of duties and responsibilities for fulflling targets of education as between private and public sectors. Just as in the sphere of economic activity, the economic policy of Government defines the precise areas of industry where private and public sectors should operate, a similar demarcation should be made in the field of education. With some encouragement, the private sector will be able to do a good deal for the development of education.

There is need for better utilisation of existing resources, both in men and money. A committee had been appointed three years ago under the chairmanship of Dr. V.K.R.V. Rao to examine some aspects of this problem. For example, taking the question of the utilisation of womanpower, several women who are already trained and have appropriate skills could be utilized for part-time teaching arrangements. Many schools have no science teachers and the services of women science graduates on a part-time basis could be utilised to solve the problem. We are poor not because of the lack of resources but because we do not use the existing human potential. A better coordination should be effected between the States, Centre and local bodies in this regard.

More effective coordination is also required between similar activities of different departments. For example, finances are available for programmes of adult literacy but these are not dovetailed adequately with the schemes of other departments which have the same objective.

Considerable experimentation is going on in the voluntary sector but there is no correct assessment of what is happening The efforts made by voluntary enterprise are not given sufficient publicity. A committee should be set up to go into the question and bring out a report for wide circulation. Many experiments have been made with regard to school improvement schemes in Madras And other States. This Committee could study such efforts and see what public and private sectors can do and how responsibilities could be allocated between defferent sectors.

Education Minister, Rajasthan :

We cannot get all the money that we want. We will have to cut our plans according to size and forget fancy programmes which we often cherish. The country is facing famine and floods and can ill-afford to think in terms of education. We have, therefore, to adjust ourselves to the allocations that are available and accommodate our demands to the resources in sight.

A point was raised about conserving resources. In this context, the allocations that we have suggested for programmes like NSC do not seem to suit a poor country like ours. The funds proposed to be spent on such. programmes could be utilised for better purposes. It is urgent that we conserve our resources, and channelise them properly.

A mention was made by a member earlier about the backwardness of Hindi States. The mother tongue has nothing to do with the backwardness of these States. Rajasthan had been divided, till 1950, into many feudal units. But it has been possible to reach the -people through the medium of their mother tongue, Hindi, which has been responsible for bringing the State to a more progressive condition. Otherwise, large gap which had existed in the past would have continued. Language can never be a reason for backwardness. Historical, social and economic factors and not the language have been responsible for the backwardness of Rajasthan.