Cover Story

Reality Check: India's crumbling education system

Published by the National University of Educational Planning & Administration, Delhi, Elementary Education in India 2005-06 — An Analytical Report is a devastating indictment of government neglect of primary education which has extracted a heavy price from Indian society. Dilip Thakore reports

After the euphoria, the cold reality check. Educationworld’s first detailed survey of India’s most respected schools, ranked according to the perceptions of a carefully selected sample of middle class parents, principals, teachers and educationists in 15 cities countrywide (EW August), generated unprecedented enthusiasm. For instance during the course of a follow-up seminar-cum-workshop attended by over 50 school principals and teachers in Ahmedabad on August 18, it became plainly evident that within India’s community of upscale educators the need for reform, contemporisation and upgradation of the education system is acquiring unstoppable momentum.

Convened as it was within a few days of prime minister Manmohan Singh’s Independence Day address to the nation from the ramparts of Delhi’s historic Red Fort, during which he pledged his government to promoting 6,000 new schools, new colleges in 370 districts, 1,600 ITIs, 10,000 new vocational schools and 50,000 additional skill development centres as also seven new Indian Institutes of Management and eight Indian Institutes of Technology, speaker after speaker at the EW seminar in Ahmedabad urged a great leap forward in education — primary, secondary and tertiary — as the pre-condition of India’s transformation into an equitable developed society.

Yet the scale and dimensions of the national effort required — particularly in the government sector (Central, state and local) — is beyond the imagination of the public and perhaps even the great majority of educators in Indian academia. The painful reality of Indian education is that its composition is of a few institutions of excellence atop a pyramid completely decayed at the base. This is particularly true of the school education system with the top 72 global standard primaries-cum secondaries ranked in the IMRB-EducationWorld survey the mirror opposites of the 1 million plus — especially government schools — providing unacceptably poor quality infrastructure and education to over 200 million children across the country.

Therefore there was a unanimous consensus that ‘to raise teaching-learning standards to global norms’ (the theme of the EW August 18 seminar), requires not only massive investment by way of people, money and materials, but a revolutionary change of the national mindset and structural framework of the education system as well. In particular liberal encouragement of private sector trusts, societies and entrepreneurs into Indian education is an urgent necessity. This conclusion is confirmed by Elementary Education in India 2005-06, An Analytical Report — a comprehensive survey of the status of elementary education in all 604 districts into which the country is divided for administrative purposes — published in July this year.

This valuable annual report is the socially beneficial fallout of the highly successful District Primary Education Programme (DPEP) which first began monitoring primary education initiatives in 42 most backward districts of the country in 1994. "A need was felt to develop a computerised educa-tional management information system for facilitating decentralised planning and management. Accordingly the responsibility to develop a District Information System for Education (DISE) was assigned to NUEPA (National University of Educational Planning and Administration).

"I am happy to note that the process that was initiated in 42 districts across seven DPEP Phase-1 states has now been expanded to all the 35 states and Union territories of the country. The database generated through DISE has been significantly contributing towards strengthening evidence-based decentralised planning and monitoring of primary and upper primary education at the district and sub-district levels," says Prof. Ved Prakash vice-chancellor of the Delhi-based NUEPA. Formerly the National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, it was granted university status under the University Grants Commission Act, 1956 in August last year (2006).

Although according to Ved Prakash DISE data has been "significantly contributing" to the planning and development of primary education in the country, Elementary Education in India 2005-06 (EEI 2005-06) is in fact a devastating indictment of government neglect of primary education, which has extracted a heavy price — and will continue to extract a heavy price into the foreseeable future — from Indian society because of a conspicuous failure to develop the country’s abundant human resource. This is perhaps why even though EEI 2005-06 is published by NUEPA and the department of school education and literacy of the Union human resource development ministry, both NUEPA and the ministry have distanced themselves from it.

"The views expressed and the conclusions reached are that of the author and should not be attributed to the government of India or to NUEPA," says a cautionary disclaimer on the inside cover page of this massive 422 page analytical report, to which is appended a 71 page States Report Card 2005-06 which offers a wealth of statistics and enables identification of the country’s best performing and laggard states in delivering elementary education (see table p.32).

Dr. Arun C. Mehta, author of this first ever comprehensive national report on the status of elementary education covering all of India’s 604 districts, is jubilant about this unprecedented data-gathering exercise and particularly about the software program "designed entirely in-house by NUEPA". "The DISE programme began in 2001 and this is the first time we have expanded our coverage to encompass every district in the country," says Mehta.

On the substantive question of the highlights of EEI 2005-06, Mehta, an alumnus of Rajasthan University who signed up with NIEPA (as it then was) in 1980, is inclined to see the glass as half full rather than half empty. "The report indicates that there has been consistent growth in elementary education infrastructure and gross enrollment, particularly of girl children. All this is testimony to the success of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan (Education for All programme) introduced by the Central government in 2001. However on the debit side the number of children dropping out before entering upper primary school is unacceptably high and learning outcomes in primaries and upper primaries are not satisfactory," says Mehta who declined to be drawn into a detailed discussion on the salient features of EEI 2005-06.

Mehta’s reluctance to offer more than carefully guarded comment on the ground that he doesn’t wish to "generate controversy" is hardly surprising. In effect the report is a sweeping indictment of government-provided elementary education and testimony to post-independence India’s socio-economic planning blindspot, which is the prime cause of the persistent poverty and backwardness of 830 million Indians eking out miserable lives on a per capita income of Rs.20 per day, if a shocking report of the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (in which 83 percent of the population is employed) is even remotely accurate.

According to EEI 2005-06, of the 1,124,033 recognised schools in 604 districts across 35 states and Union territories countrywide, 87.23 percent (980,494) are sited in rural India. The Hindi heartland state of Uttar Pradesh (pop.180 million) hosts the largest number of schools — 161,689 — in the country. And of all the 1.124 million ‘recognised’ schools (primary, upper primary and secondary) countrywide, 83.14 percent (934,521) are owned and/or administered by Central, state or local governments, says the report. Therefore the great infirmity in school education — particularly in elementary or foundational education — is of the public or government school system. Although there are small islands of academic excellence in the government school system (926 Kendriya Vidyalayas, 551 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas), undoubtedly the saving grace of India’s education system are the 189,521 privately promoted and administered schools with an aggregate enrollment of 54 million students. Of them 63,411 are private aided (recipients of government subsidy) and 126,110 private unaided (i.e independent) schools.

Although EEI 2005-06 and author Arun Mehta step gingerly in the matter of making public-private school comparisons, presumably because the report is published by NUEPA and the HRD ministry — both government organisations — this elementary education survey is replete with perhaps inadvertent observations which highlight the wide qualitative gap between government and private school education. For instance while making the shocking disclosure that 107,276 schools countrywide have only one classroom and that the average elementary school in India has a mere 3.8 classrooms, the report comments: "Irrespective of the school type, schools managed by private managements are much comfortable (sic) in terms of number of classrooms compared to schools managed by government managements."

Similarly while disclosing another shocker that as many as 136,848 schools countrywide have only one teacher, the report notes that "schools managed by government have much higher percentage of single teacher schools (14.13 percent) compared to private managed schools (2.87 percent)". If this data is linked with the well-documented fact that 25 percent (i.e 1 million) government school teachers are absent every day, poor learning outcomes, which is a defining characteristic of the primary education system, is hardly surprising.

To its credit, despite the constraint of being a Central government published report, EEI 2005-06 tells it like it is. Among the other exposés: 93 percent of private schools provide drinking water facilities as against 81 percent of government schools; 70 percent of private schools provide common toilets for students cf. only 49 percent of government schools. Please note these are national averages. In some states such as Orissa (pop. 36.8 million) and Bihar (83 million) only 32 percent and 35 percent of schools are equipped with common toilets and a mere 12.4 percent and 11.8 percent respectively offer separate toilet facilities for girl children. Quite evidently benighted educrats in Delhi and the state capitals are unaware that the annual Human Development Reports of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and surveys of the World Bank have repeatedly highlighted the direct and proven causal linkage between under-provision of separate toilet facilities and unacceptably high school drop-out percentages of girl children in developing countries.

In this connection it is pertinent to note that although in EEI 2005-06 private schools compare favourably with government schools on almost every count, in terms of most facilities and conveniences they provide only marginally superior infrastructure. The fact that almost 60,000 private schools countrywide have failed and neglected to provide common toilet facilities to children with most others failing to provide separate toilets for girl children, is indicative of the rot which pervades the country’s entire school system.

Since the year 2005, the Mumbai- based child welfare and education NGO Pratham (estb. 1994) which provides pre-school, in-school and out-of-school education to over 1 million children in 21 states across India, has published two invaluable ASER (Annual Status of Education Report) surveys which measure learning outcomes in government schools in rural India. In the latter months of 2006, over 20,000 Pratham volunteers — mainly college and university students — fanned out into 549 of India’s 575 rural districts to test the learning proficiencies of students in government primary schools. ASER 2006 which was published in February this year, confirms the worst fears of government school critics that very little learning happens in them.

According to ASER 2006, one-third (33.8 percent) of children in classes III-V of primary schools cannot read a simple class I or II textbook. Likewise one third (35.3 percent) of class III-V pupils can’t do simple subtraction sums and 54.7 percent of class V children are stumped by division; and one out of every eight class V students can’t write a simple dictated sentence. These are all-India averages; in several states, learning outcomes in primary schools are worse. In short, although over 200 million children are in government primary schools at the start of every academic year, very little knowledge or learning is transmitted to them. Little wonder that before the completion of upper primary schooling (class VII), 53 percent (105 million) children drop out, and only 33 million make it into secondary school (class X). Of these only 10 million enter institutions of tertiary education. And of the estimated 2.5-3 million who graduate from college, a mere one-third (750,000-1 million) are employable — much too small a number for an economy expanding at 9 percent per year.

Rather belatedly post-independence India’s dim-bulb captains of commerce and industry are beginning to discern the implications of this colossal wastage of human resources — rooted in a pathetically weak and neglected elementary school system — for industrial growth and development.

"It’s well known that children’s experiences in their early childhood profoundly affect their ability to succeed in life. The neglect of elementary education for several decades, especially in rural India, has seriously impacted industry, society and the nation as a whole. Failure to provide strong foundational education to millions of children has limited their ability to absorb new technologies and exhibit ownership and accountability, which are the most important skill-sets required in the manufacturing sector of industry in particular. There is a direct connection between the poor quality school system and relatively low agriculture and shopfloor productivity of Indian industry," says M. Muthaiah vice president (human resources) of Carborundum Universal Ltd, Chennai (annual sales: Rs.844 crore), a constituent company of the Chennai-based Murugappa Group.

In Mumbai, the commercial capital of the country, industrialists who were hitherto indifferent about the quality of the huge pool of cheap labour available at their beck and call, are somewhat belatedly beginning to grasp the connection between improved elementary education and productivity in industry.

"With the Indian economy riding a high growth trajectory, during the next 20 years an education and skills bottleneck will severely affect Indian industry’s global competitivity if youth with strong foundational education and skills are not available in plenty. In my view even as Central government spending on education is rising, it is important for state governments to accord high priority to this subject. In particular the Centre should help state governments to improve the quality of elementary education. NUEPA’s EEI 2005-06 report is a wake up call to government and industry to join forces to improve elementary education. With half the population of India less than 25 years of age, equipping them with employable skills has never been more critical," says Niraj Bajaj, managing director of Mukund Ltd (sales: Rs.200 crore in 2005-06) and incumbent president of the Indian Merchants Chamber (estb. 1907), the pioneer representative organisation of industry and business in the country’s commercial capital.

Quite clearly contemporary India’s ramshackle education system is ill-equipped to meet the needs of a fast growth economy which requires industry-ready and/or quickly trainable workers. Decades of pent up energy and the painfully acquired experience of a rapidly graying labour pool in industry, has enabled the Indian economy to record unprecede-ntedly high year-on-year rates of industrial growth. But given the much-too-few poor quality managers, workers and farmers being produced by a crumbling education system, it is unlikely that current annual rates of economic growth will be sustained unless an urgent national effort is made to revive the education system starting at the bottom, i.e primary and elementary schooling.

Dr. A.S. Seetharamu hitherto professor of education at the Institute of Social and Economic Change (ISEC), Bangalore believes that the way out of the morass in which elementary education is mired, is to switch to a system of school-based planning. "A major drawback of the Indian education system is that there is negligible review of teacher and school performance. It’s important for governments at the Centre and states and for local communities to value every school and institution of learning as a national asset. This mindset change will encourage school-based planning for institutional development with the involvement of local communities. The funding of government schools should be needs-based and linked with school-site performance to be assessed by local communities and independent organisations. That’s the formula for attracting children to school, retaining them, and improving learning outcomes," says Seetharamu.

Intensified independent evaluation of learning outcomes at all levels in the education system — especially in elementary education, pioneered by the NGO Pratham — is also advocated by Dr. Samuel Paul, former director of IIM-Ahmedabad, visiting professor at Harvard University and currently the promoter-trustee of the Bangalore-based Public Affairs Centre which has won global notices for designing systems to monitor and evaluate services provided by government departments and utilities in Karnataka and beyond. "The deep poverty and ignorance of rural India has made parents in village communities unmindful of the quality of education dispensed by local schools. Therefore proxy methodologies have to be devised to assess learning outcomes and check teacher absenteeism in government schools. PAC will soon start monitoring schools in selected districts of Karnataka to this end," says Paul.

Fortunately the critical importance of delivering high quality elementary education on a mass scale for national development has been rather belatedly acknowledged in Yojana Bhavan, Delhi, headquarters of the 28,000-strong Planning Commission, which over the past half century has drawn up 11 detailed Soviet-style five-year plans for balanced national development. Quite obviously education has been low on its list of priorities.

However judging by the tall promises made by prime minister Manmohan Singh on Independence Day about expanding the education system, awareness that qualitative education — particularly elementary education — is the bedrock of national development seems to have dawned upon the collective mind of government, and the self-centred Indian establishment. Therefore the approach paper to the Eleventh Plan (2007-2012) makes brave resolutions of intent about giving a major boost to founda-tional education during the next quinquennium.

Yet while the approach paper articulates politically correct platitudes about the "constitutional obligation of the state to provide free and compulsory education of good quality" to all children in the six-14 age group, there is a sense of déjà vu about this declaration of intent. In particular the exhortation to government to "move toward" raising the annual outlay (Centre plus states) to 6 percent of GDP denotes a familiar lack of urgency. The ramshackle infrastructure and abysmal learning outcomes of the government school system demand this goal is attained in the very next Union budget scheduled to be presented to Parliament next February.

This is not as tall an order as made out by hard-hearted mandarins of the Union finance ministry. A road map to attain this overdue objective has been repeatedly presented in this publication (see EW cover stories in February and April, 2007). Through modest reductions in defence and government expenditure, slashing unmerited middle class subsidies and disinvestment of public sector enterprises, an additional sum of Rs.100,000 crore can be easily and expeditiously mobilised for investment in upgrading the education infrastructure, especially of elementary schools. But compelling government to bite the bullet and redraw its wasteful priorities requires public pressure — which means you, dear reader — and regeneration of the wells of empathy within the establishment for the nation’s 450 million patient and vulnerable children. That’s the tall order.

With Autar Nehru (Delhi); Gaver Chatterjee (Mumbai) & Hemalatha Raghupathi (Chennai)