INTRODUCTION
Educational surveys have come to stay as essential tools for scientific planning in the area of education with special reference to the Five Year Plans. The First All India Educational Survey was organised in early 1957 by the Ministry of Education in collaboration with all the States and Union Territories. This was followed by the Second All India Educational Survey in late 1965 and the NCERT was responsible for conducting this survey, again with the active coope- ration of all the States and Union Territories. The present survey, the third in the series, which is also organised by the NCERT, was started in November 1973, needless to say, with the collaboration of States and Union Territories.
Need for such surveys, particularly in developing countries with meagre resources, arises mainly due to educational imbalances especially in rural areas and also due to inequality in educational opportunities. Thus when the First Educational Survey was organised in 1957, its main aim was to identify all the rural habitations with and without educational facilities and to plan the location of schools on a rational basis, so that the educational imbalances at that time existing could be narrowed down. After this survey was conducted and the recommendations for planning and location of schools were made, a follow-up was necessary to ascertain how far the data or the First Survey were utilised for planning and location of schools. Further, after this survey a lot of demographic changes had taken place and programmes under Second and Third Five Year Plans had been implemented. This called for a fresh survey and thus Second All India Educational Survey was initiated in order to identify every habitation, assess the schooling facilities at all school stages obtaining at that time and plan school areas for every primary, middle and secondary school, to derive maximum benefit with minimum additional outlay from the existing schooling facilities and those to be provided in future. From the Second Survey, it was observed that nearly 95% of the rural population had primary schooling facilities up to a distance of 1 mile (1.6 km) and only 5% of the rural population had this facility beyond 1 mile. According to the Advisory Committee for the Second Survey, an educational survey of similar type was to be organised during an interval of five years, preferably during the fourth year of the Plan, so that the data of the Survey could be fruitfully utilised in formulating die next Five Year Plan. As per this suggestion, the Third All India Educational Survey should have been organised during 1972, in which case the data could have been made available for formulating the Fifth Five Year Plan. The NCERT initiated some action by inviting comments and suggestions regarding inclusion of items for the Third Survey in the area of school education and several States and Union Territories responded. But due to various administrative and technical reasons this Survey could not be initiated before June, 1973.
The Government of India vide their order No. F. 15-1/69- NCERT/schools IV dated May 8, 1973 constituted an Advisory Committee for conducting the Third All India Educational Survey.
The Committee held its meetings on 19th and 20th June, 1973. The then Minister for Education, Prof. Nurul Hasan presided. His presidential address marked the guidelines for the Committee to lay down the aims and objectives of the Third All-India Educational Survey. The following are some important excerpts from his address :
"A proposal which has been received and on which I would like your considered opinion is to the effect that the Third Educational Survey should cover the entire educational system and all existing institutions at all stages and of all categories. This is necessary to have a comprehensive picture of the total educational system. It will also indicate the progress we have
2 THIRD ALL-INDIA EDUCATIONAL SURVEY
made in the last 12 years. This will, no doubt, involve much more work than in the two earlier surveys covering educational institutions from the pre-primary to the university stages. However, it would seem to be a necessary exercise.
The information that we collect about educational institutions may have to be expanded considerably. For instance, we do not know the total investment made in the national educational system in the form of lands, building and equipment; we do not have full information about the public library system; there is little available data about programmes of non-formal education which, though limited, are significant; information about teachers on the basis of their age or total emoluments is lacking; precise information about the manner and extent of community support to education is also not available. The list of such items can be very large. It is in this area particularly that we need the advice of the Committee : to determine the data which has to be collected for all educational institutions, both from the point of view of long-term needs of educational planning and development and the requirements of the Fifth Five-Year Plan.
This Survey will have to emphasise the planning of the locations for educational institutions of different categories. At the primary stage, the new schools required may not be many, but the problem obviously needs to be examined. At the middle school stage, a very large expansion is called for, if education in the age group 11-14 is to be universalised. The location of middle schools thus assumes significance. But at the secondary and university stages, there has been a proliferation of small uneconomic and academically non-viable institutions. It is, therefore, necessary to survey the location of these institutions also. The same observations will apply to the location of vocational schools in view of the major programme we propose to develop in the Fifth Plan.
There is also a need to study some important aspects of our educational system and its functioning. For instance, there is need for a study of the socioeconomic background of the students who are enrolled in higher education. This will show clearly the classes which now benefit mostly from the system of higher education and will have an important bearing on formulation of policy. It is necessary to have some clear idea of the first generation learners in our colleges and universities and of the enrolments from each Scheduled Caste or Tribe. We need studies, scientifically planned and carried out, about wastage and stagnation at different stages. A careful and comprehensive study of the examination system as a whole quite apart from the usual statistics of students who appeared and passed, that are generally collected and published-will also be necessary. The variation in the rates of fees, the extent of free studentships in secondary and higher education, the extent and coverage of scholarships at all stages, and hostel facilities are other areas of significance and interest. I do not think it necessary for me to elaborate this list. I look forward to your advice to identify and highlight those aspects of our educational system and its functioning which are relevant to policy formulation in the Fifth Plan, and include them in the programme of this Survey.
We thus need more information about the entire educational system. What is equally important, we need it quickly."
Considering the scope of this survey, which covered all aspects of education right from pre-primary through university, including deemed universities, non-formal education, unrecognised institutions, technical and vocational education, educational administration and inspection and cultural education all of which could not have been conducted by any single agency, the Advisory Committee decided that each area of the survey should be entrusted to a separate agency and a sub-committee be set up in each case to draft the schedules necessary for the survey and advise and guide the concerned agency for conducting the survey. The agencies which were entrusted with the organisation of various areas of survey are :
(1) National Council of Educational Research and Training-School Education and allied areas.
(2) University Grants Commission-Higher Education at the first degree level and onwards as also deemed universities.
(3) Institute of Applied Manpower Research- Technical and Vocational Education up to the undergraduate level.
(4) National Staff College for Educational Planners and Administrators-Educational Administration and Inspection.
(5) Department of Culture, Ministry of Education and Social Welfare-Cultural Education.
In addition, National Council of Educational Research and Training was to coordinate the work of various agencies involved in the Third All India Educational Survey, with Dr. Shib K. Mitra, Joint Director (now Director) as Member-Secretary of the survey. The Member-Secretary was also a member of the SubCommittees of all the areas of the survey.
On the recommendations of the Advisory Committee for the Third Survey, a Sub-Committee comprising the following members was constituted :
INTRODUCTION 3
1. Shri M.V. Rajagopal,
Secretary to the Government of Andhra Pradesh,
Education Department,
Hyderabad.
2. Dr. S.N. Mehrotra,
Director of Education,
Uttar Pradesh.
Lucknow.
3. Dr. M.B. Buch,
Head,
Centre for Advanced Studies in Education,
M.S. University of Baroda,
Baroda.
4. Prof. H.B. Mazumdar,
Adhyaksha,
Vinaya Bhawana,
Vishwa Bharati,
Shantiniketan.
5. Dr. N.K. Upasani,
Chairman,
S.S.C. Board,
Maharashtra,
Poona.
6. Dr. V.R. Taneja,
Director,
State Institute of Education,
Haryana,
Gurgaon.
The first meeting of the Sub-Committee was held on 8th and 9th November 1973, in the NCERT premises. The academic staff of the Survey and Data Processing Unit, NCERT was present.
In this meeting, the Sub-Committee considered the various schedules drafted by the Survey and Data Processing Unit in the NCERT, on the basis of the views and suggestions received from the States and other agencies. Further, the Minister in his address had desired that this survey should cover all types of educational institutions imparting educational instruction in all areas, both recognised as well as unrecognised. This meant covering institutions right from nursery to Higher Secondary/Intermediate, Junior Colleges, PUC, unrecognised institutions coaching students up to these stages, institutions for the physically handicapped, institutions like Sanskrit Pathshalas, Madrasahs and Maktabs imparting instruction in Persian and Arabic, Urdu schools, Bible schools and Tibetan schools in addition, information about teachers in schools, teacher training institutions at pre-primary and elementary levels, teacher educators at elementary level, colleges and institutes of physical education were also to be collected.
As the National Council of Educational Research and Training was the Co-ordinating agency, it was also expected to ensure that work of different agencies was not duplicated and the agencies collaborate with one another in the collection of data needed for the purpose. Thus, NCERT had to shoulder the additional responsibility in the collection of data on (i) Inspection and Supervision (National Staff College), (ii) Nonformal Education (Ministry of Education and Social Welfare), (iii) Tribal Education in the Sub-plan regions under the Fifth Five Year Plan in six States (Ministry of Home Affairs), (iv) Cultural Statistics (Department of Culture, Ministry of Education and Social Welfare).
Although as per recommendations of the Advisory Committee, the NCERT was concerned with the survey relating to institutions covering undergraduate courses, it had to cover Secondary Teacher Traning Institutions which train teacher trainees for B.T. or B.Ed. course and the teacher educators in these institutions. Of course, this was due to the fact that Teacher Education forms an integral part of the school education system. The broad objectives of the Third All-India Educational Survey have been outlined in the Union Education Minister's address. The specific objectives relating to survey in the area of School Education have been provided in a later chapter.
Staffing pattern at the NCERT and state levels In the NCERT the work was entrusted to the Survey and Data Processing Unit. This unit had a staff of one Head, one Reader, five lecturers, four Senior Research Assistants (for a short period only) and six Research Assistants. This was the strength of the academic staff at the time of the Survey. This was the permanent staff in the unit.
In States, while there was a District Survey Officer for every revenue district for a period of six months, the staffing pattern, at the state level for a duration of 18 months, was as follows :
(1) State Survey Officer-1
(2) Asst. State Survey Officer
-one for every 10 districts or part there of
(3) Statistical Assistants-2
(4) Stenographer-cum-Typist- 1
(5) Typist-cum-LDC-1
Directors of Education/Directors of Public Instruction were ex- officio Directors of the survey.
Training programme for the state survey officers A training programme of the State Survey Officers as organised in NCERT, New Delhi from November 20-30, 1973. The State Survey Officer designates from
4 THIRD ALL-INDIA EDUCATIONAL SURVEY
all the States and Union Territories except from Tamil Nadu and Lakshadweep were present in the training programme. The State Survey Officers were further exposed to the field work to acquaint themselves with the process of collection of data, scrutiny and analysis of the data. For the purpose of field work, the State Survey Officers were also taken to some blocks in Gurgaon in Haryana. In this training programme, the first 12 schedules, information blanks to be canvassed, were finalised. As there were many schedules to be canvassed, which in some cases were to be at district level only, instructions for filling up of these blanks were provided on the questionnaire itself.
Unlike the previous surveys where separate information blanks were to be used for primary and secondary stages, this time the information blank to be canvassed was common for all the school stages. It was apprehended that the teachers in primary schools may not be in a position to understand English. Nor was it possible to get the information blanks printed in regional languages centrally. However, in the case of Teacher Training Institutions at the Elementary and Secondary stages as well as Teacher Educators in these institutions, as also for Cultural Education information which had to be collected from secondary schools only, the information blanks were printed centrally in English and was supplied to States and Union Territories in adequate quantities.
Unlike the earlier surveys where the processing of data was done manually, in the present survey some schedules were processed through computers while most of the others were to be processed manually. The data to be processed by computer was either at the district or state level and finally at the national level. Coming to the data to be processed manually, most of it was to be compiled at four levels, viz., block, district, state and national levels. In this case, as many as 100 tables were got printed at the national level and distributed to Block Education Officers in sufficient quantity through District Survey Officers. For district and state level compilation, the tablets were mimeographed and supplied from the Centre.
Training programme in states As soon as the training programme of the State Survey Officers in New Delhi was completed, the State Survey Officers were to go back to their respective States and organise similar training programmes for the District Survey Officers. The District Survey Officers were, in turn, to organise similar training to Block Education Officers. Despite requests from the Ministry of Education and Social Welfare to the States to establish the State and District Survey Units, several States did not initiate action in time. In states like Orissa and Uttar Pradesh, the mid-term polls in March 1974 also delayed the start of the work. While originally only the first 12 schedules were to be canvassed, later on several agencies wanted additional information to be collected for them. All this delayed the survey work.
Sikkim, the 22nd State joined the mainstream of the Republic only in 1975 while the survey had started in late 1973. Hence NCERT organised a survey on similar lines in the State of Sikkim in May, 1976. As this survey was the first of its kind in the State, the information blanks had to be slightly modified. Hence the data of this State have not been included in the present report.