THE commitment to provide free and compulsory education for all children up to fourteen years of age is enshrined in the Indian Constitution. Though successive national plans have recorded significant improvements, the final goal of providing quality education for all even after fifty years of planned development still eludes the country. ‘Performance in the field of education is one of the most disappointing aspects of India’s developmental strategy. Out of approximately 200 million children in the age group 6-14 years, only 120 million are in school and net attendance at the primary level is only 66% of enrolment. This is completely unacceptable and the tenth plan should aim at a radical transformation. Education for all must be one of the primary objectives of the tenth plan.’¹

Yet, a scan of progress under the 10th five year plan period indicates the numerous challenges that remain. The first goal set by the 10th five year plan was to ensure that all children are enrolled in schools or other alternatives by 2003. It is not clear if ‘enrolment’ refers to all children currently in the total compulsory age group or only to children of a smaller age band, say 6-7. Since age specific enrolment data are not systematically collected, it is near impossible to determine if even children in the smaller age band are fully enrolled. According to the annual report of the MHRD for 2003-04, the number of out-of-school children, however, has come down from 35 million in 2001-02 to an estimated 23 million in 2003-04. A more recent assessment by the Government of India shows that this number has come down further to 10.4 million as on April 2005.²

It is equally crucial to identify the types of schools in which the children are supposed to be enrolled. The steep reduction in the out-of-school children reported in recent years seems to be due to establishment of a large number of small schools, many of which are run by single teachers employed locally on a contract basis. For instance, in 2002-03 around 9.5 million children were enrolled in such schools, which included more than 275,000 children in short-term bridge courses with the hope of eventually mainstreaming them into regular schools. Even if children enrolled in bridge courses are not considered, most of these schools would not be able to take the students beyond second or third grade. What happens to these children as they complete initial years of schooling? Are these sustainable? These are important questions as the second and third goals of the 10th plan, viz., ‘All children will complete five years of schooling by 2007’ and ‘All children will complete eight years of schooling by 2010’, largely depend on addressing this issue effectively.

Even though there has been substantial improvement in the participation levels of children in primary schools in recent years, this will have a positive impact only when coupled with high retention and completion rates. But one finds that reduction in the dropout rate during the last decade is only marginal. The situation is even more alarming with respect to the upper primary stage. One has to reckon that claims of reduction in out-of-school children based on mere enrolment are of little consequence if one in three children entering grade I fails to complete even five years of schooling, and of those who survive and transit to the upper primary stage, another 50% dropout without completing the full cycle of elementary education. If one counts all children who are dropping out in the middle as out-of-school, the number would go up to between 40-50 million. It is, however, important to note that this number is usually estimated using the enrolment data from government and recognized private aided schools and the projected enrolment in the relevant age group. This information, therefore, has to be factored in while assessing the progress made towards the critical goals of ensuring that all children complete five and eight years of schooling by 2007 and 2010 respectively.

It is, of course, known that the problem is not uniformly grave in all the states. The 7th AIES showed that in 2002-03, most of the out-of-school children in the age group 6-11 were accounted for by a few selected states, namely, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. However, at the upper primary stage, even relatively better performing states such as Karnataka and Maharashtra show considerable problems with a sizeable proportion of children remaining outside the fold of schooling.

 

The 10th plan goals explicitly highlight the need for special measures to overcome gender disparities and to reach education more effectively to children of SCs and STs. It is proposed to bridge all gender and social gaps in enrolment, retention and learning achievement at the primary stage by 2007 and reduce the gap to 5% at the upper primary stage. It is also proposed that special interventions and strategies be adopted to include girls, SC/ST children, working children, children with special needs, urban deprived children, children from minority groups, children below the poverty line, migratory children and children in the hardest-to-reach groups.

 

Though girls’ enrolment has shown a significant rise during the last few years, gender disparity does not seem to be getting reduced. Even the gross enrolment ratio for girls does not touch the 100% mark at the primary stage. If one discounts around 18-20% of this as reflecting the presence of overage and underage groups, less than 80% girls in the age group 6-11 are enrolled in primary schools. The difference in the enrolment ratio between boys and girls continues to be at around ten percentage points. The situation is even more disturbing at the upper primary stage where the GER falls below 60% level for girls. Particular attention in this regard is required in some states such as Bihar, Jammu & Kashmir, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. In fact, not even two out of ten girls in the age group 6-11 in Uttar Pradesh are in primary school.

Yet there are some positive features with respect to girls’ education. Ever since the beginning of the 1990s, the progress in girls’ enrolment has been faster than that of boys. In the 6-11 age group, this could possibly be explained by the fact that GER for boys already exceeds 100% and is therefore, in a stabilization phase. But, one also finds that the increase has been consistently high for 11-14 age group. This uniformly fast increase in girls’ enrolment indicates that with carefully planned strategic interventions, the gender gap can be substantially reduced at a faster pace. Second, it also belies the oft-held assumption that the absence of an upper primary school within the village is a serious deterrent to girls’ participation and that large number of girls drop out after completing primary cycle because of the distance involved in reaching the nearest upper primary school. Of course, these are broad observations based on average figures. It is necessary to disaggregate the data and mark out regions and states where the increase is substantial and those where it is still at a low level.

 

There has been a general euphoria in recent years over the enormous increase in enrolment of children in primary schools. But, are we recruiting an adequate number of teachers to teach them? In general, state governments have been slow in recruiting teachers, even against existing positions and most states have a large backlog of vacant teacher posts. Consequently, notwithstanding some recruitment of teachers on a contract basis, the teacher-pupil ratio far exceeds the norm of 1:40 in some states far, higher than even the national average. The situation requires immediate attention in four states – Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Worse, teachers recruited in these states for several years are now often without any professional training in pedagogy.

Apart from the fact that teachers have to deal with crowded classes, they have also to contend with minimal infrastructure and academic facilities. Close to three out of four primary schools in the country involve multi-grade teaching. A substantial proportion of schools do not even have a proper building, leave alone other facilities. This complex situation in which teachers have to work gets further compounded when one considers the figures for single teacher schools.

As the data from official records indicate, the task of getting children into school has been fairly successful in recent years. This is clearly evident from the fact that only around 5% children are out of school. It is, therefore, necessary that the attention in the 11th plan shifts from enrolment to effective functioning of schools. This would probably require substantial redrawing of the components of the SSA. Effort should be directed towards consolidating the gains made in enrolment and limit future action in this regard to specific disadvantaged groups such as SCs, STs, children with special needs, child labourers excluded from schooling, street children and children of migrant families.

 

The main focus of action will have to be on improving the functioning of schools and enhancing the quality of their outcomes. In the existing framework, two components are specially focused on individual schools, namely, school-specific grants following the pattern of the DPEP and individual teacher grants. However, these components have remained unexamined and isolated from the overall concern for improving quality of every school in a holistic manner. Nor has there been any assessment on the impact of such grants in cumulatively transforming the school, or on classroom teaching of teachers.

It is critical that these interlinked investments in schools are viewed from a long-term perspective of improving the quality of every school. The goal has to be that all schools change and for the better. In reality, there are schools that are improving and those that are not. Without careful monitoring and follow up, the scheme of school and teacher grants have become mere spending propositions without any consolidation and a clear understanding of what cumulative impact they could make on school functioning.

The lesson from global experience is that overall improvement in quality of education can be achieved more effectively if individual schools are holistically targeted for improvement in terms of their management and performance. In other words, such support to schools has to be designed specifically for each school and the initiative should be at the local level. Financial support to schools should be linked to preparation of holistic plans for school improvement. This could be effectively implemented making use of the process of political and administrative decentralization unfolding in many states. PRIs and other grassroots level bodies such as school management committees and VECs could be involved in preparing such plans and receiving funds for elementary education.

 

Quality improvement in schools cannot be achieved only through input provision. It also demands a regular system for oversight and monitoring. In most states the internal monitoring mechanisms have collapsed. International experience has also demonstrated the value of establishing independent organizations for quality assessment and monitoring of schools who serve as social watch on all schools – public and private. The Karnataka government has recently begun to experiment with such an organization and its experience could be used in shaping the institutional arrangement in different states. Care should be taken to see that they do not become part of the captive subordinate state sector institutions such as SCERTs and SIEMATs.

Recent assessments show that girls’ participation in schooling has improved significantly during the last 10-15 years. However, the Global Monitoring Report on progress towards EFA goals considers the progress to be far from satisfactory and declares the country to be at risk of not achieving the goal of gender parity and equality as envisaged in the Dakar Declaration. It should be noted that this is also one of the Millennium Development Goals. Are the strategies for girls’ education pursued appropriate?

 

Coverage under the two gender-focused programmes initiated under the 10th plan is likely to be quite limited whereas the problem of girls’ participation is widespread covering even states which are otherwise well placed in education development.

It is important that a gender perspective is incorporated into all aspects of planning. For instance, in order to promote girls’ participation in schooling, Operation Blackboard required that the second teacher appointed to any primary school with one teacher would be a woman teacher. The early 1990s also saw the emergence of explicit programmes for women’s empowerment such as Mahila Samakhya as a means of improving participation of girls in schools. The problem of non-participation of girls in schooling has been well-explored and the causes known. While inaccessibility of schooling facilities is a cause, tackling deeply entrenched social factors is a greater need in many areas. This requires well-orchestrated programmes of social mobilization alongside primary education.

Information on the size and human resources available in primary schools indicates that one-fourth of the primary schools are very small with only one teacher and/or one class-room and are generally located in small habitations. It is in this context that modifying traditional distance and population norms and opening schools in small habitations has yielded positive results by bringing in more children to school. But such creation of small schools also raises the question of their long-term viability as such schools are invariably also under-equipped and fail to improve in terms of quality. Field observations reveal that if proper care is not taken this may also lead to legitimization of social divisions through schooling, as such small habitations are often inhabited by marginalized groups living on the fringes of the main village with a full-fledged school.

While establishing small and under-equipped schools is likely to continue in many states, it is important that attention is paid to consolidating existing provisions, if necessary by combining unviable small schools operating in close proximity. Though the norms of 1 km and 3 km for establishing primary and upper primary facilities could form the general rule, it need not be implemented blindly. With the demographic change taking place in several states, and the cohort entering primary school gradually shrinking, many existing schools are likely to become unviable in terms of population size. Several assertions made in the 10th plan need careful consideration in such contexts. For instance, not all habitations, even with population size of 300, need to have a school within the habitation; probably availability of road infrastructure should be factored in while opening schools.

 

The scheme of universal provision of nutritious meal to all children in primary schools began over a decade ago in 1995. However, it acquired the present shape only after the Supreme Court judgement mandating that the state provide a cooked meal. According to official reports, nearly 120 million receive MDM across all the states. Implementation of the scheme has brought in a variety of stakeholders at the field level ranging from religious bodies such as ISKON to women self-help groups. This has also raised the question: Should this be extended to children in upper primary schools? Though a desirable goal, it requires careful consideration. In many states, upper primary sections from part of secondary schools. Also, in several states, the panchayati raj ministry is in charge of primary schools and they also take care of MDM. How will these factors impact smooth implementation of the scheme at the upper primary level?

The original intent of the scheme was to view the provision of nutritional support as part of a package for improving the overall health and nutritional level of children. However, the provision of health check-up and other related medical support has remained beyond the reach of most children in government schools. Is it not appropriate to examine the possibility of introducing an appropriate scheme for health and medical support to elementary school children alongside provision of nutritional support through MDM?

 

The 10th plan document refers to creating public-private partnerships in implementing programme of elementary education. However, no attempt has been made to define the nature of such a relationship and consequently, has given rise to controversies on privatization and reduction of government responsibility. It is thus important to clarify the involvement of private providers in the 11th plan framework, without reducing it to privatization. The constitutional commitment for free and compulsory education entitles everyone, rich or poor, to benefit from state support. Many observers have pointed out that the existing understanding of the producer-provider framework in elementary education needs to be re-examined. There is no reason why non-profit private providers (NGOs) should not be encouraged to participate in the process of both producing and providing elementary education. This requires identifying specific areas where such involvement would bring value addition, viz. teacher education NGOs could also be invited to take up implementation of formal sector activities. In fact, non-profit organizations set up by several corporate entities have already demonstrated their value.

 

As noted earlier, a major programme of overhauling teacher education was envisaged in the National Policy on Education in 1986. However, to date no clear framework has emerged for professional development of teachers. It is important that adequate attention be given to this area in the 11th plan. This requires re-examining the current set of institutions supported by central funds as also evolving a better framework for in-service education of teachers.

Many countries in the developed world have clearly drawn up legislations to ensure teacher quality, making it mandatory for teachers to access suitable opportunities for professional development. Towards this end, it is important to re-examine the role of non-profit, non-state organizations so as to utilize the intellectual resources available in the private and non-profit sector.

Another important aspect relates to reforming the governance system by emphasizing community involvement. This is also linked to changes and developments in strengthening of PRIs in different states. In recent years we have seen the emergence of a variety of mechanisms to facilitate community involvement in school governance, such as SDMCs in Karnataka, empowered SMCs in Andhra Pradesh, committees of PRIs in Madhya Pradesh through the new Jana Shiksha Adhiniyam or the revamped VECs elsewhere. But in most of these cases there is a danger of dissipation unless efforts are made to link these new entities to overall administrative reform measures.

It is important to design strategies in the 11th plan implementation in a proactive fashion, and not view them as mere technical instruments of SSA. Such measures under the plan may not directly involve any financial investment but would play a critical role in giving stability to the participatory management system as envisaged in the National Policy on Education without imposing a single set of solutions for local self-governance in education to all states.

But it is not just local management that has to change. Corresponding administrative reforms have to be initiated for improving internal efficiency. A number of factors affecting the efficiency of the system, and thereby leading to high levels of wastage of resources, have been identified. Some of these are irrational teacher deployment, poor supervision of school functioning, teacher absenteeism, delay in providing financial incentives to students from marginalized groups, and poor implementation of teacher grievance redressal mechanisms. It is obvious that development programmes unaccompanied by improvement in efficiency of delivery is not likely to yield results.

 

The Indian scenario is far too complex and varied to be effectively captured through aggregate national figures. On the one hand, there is Kerala with practically every child attending primary school, and every school having at least five teachers and five classrooms. At the other end of the spectrum is Bihar, where only one out of two children in the relevant age group is in school. Towards the end of the 1990s, it was estimated that three-fourths of the out-of-school children lived in six states of the country, namely, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Gender disparity was as high as 42 percentage points for enrolment rates in Bihar and 31 percentage points in Uttar Pradesh but was only three percentage points for Kerala and five percentage points in Punjab.³ Has the situation significantly changed?

 

Estimates derived from the 7th All India Education Survey reveal a very similar story in 2002-03. Nearly 69% of out-of-primary school children are concentrated in seven states, namely, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal. Bihar and Uttar Pradesh alone account for 33.87% of out-of-school children at the primary stage. Surprisingly, with respect to girls’ education, some states like Gujarat and Haryana have regressed in recent years, falling below the national average. Thus, the problem of UEE continues to be one of inter-state disparities. That they have persisted in spite of five decades of development planning shows that the strategies adopted for education development have not adequately dealt with the issue.

It is in this context that the current framework of centre-state sharing of resources needs careful reconsideration. Following the SSA guidelines, the 10th plan initiatives operate under the formula of 75:25 between the Centre and the state governments. This is expected to be moved to a 50:50 formula during the 11th plan. How is the approach for sharing working? There is no systematic assessment made of the impact of the funding formula on implementation of the programme in different states. It should be noted that the situation with respect to internal finances of different state governments varies widely. Consequently, a uniform formula is not helpful for promoting faster progress in educationally backward states, which are also poor in their economic status. There is a danger that some state governments may freeze new development initiatives for elementary education and begin to depend solely on centrally sponsored programmes as they are required to squeeze their finances to meet their share for SSA. The fallout of such a phenomenon might be a further increase in disparities in education development among different states.

 

It is urgent that a careful analysis of the impact of the current formula for sharing of resources on progress towards UEE be taken up so that an appropriate strategy can be formulated in preparation for the 11th plan. The capacity of state governments has to be examined not only in relation to current levels of expectation, but factoring in the task involved and the total requirement of funds, if the goals of UEE are to be reached. Will the capacity of the state governments increase so dramatically to raise resources multifold for elementary education in the coming years? There is also a need to conduct a detailed analysis of state expenditure on elementary education, differentiated from the 25% offered as the complementary funding for central grants received under SSA.

 

Reliable information is at the heart of any development planning process, without which it is difficult to assess the magnitude of the task ahead and the requirement of resources. But despite the problem being repeatedly pointed out in various contexts, no consistent data are available on any of the critical indicators. There are conflicting estimates on the number of out-of-school children; on number of children dropping out without completing the elementary cycle; also, no information is available on net enrolment ratios which are considered vital for international comparisons and for computing other indices such as gender parity index and education development index. Data gaps are huge and often official statistics do not reflect the actual achievement in the elementary education sub-sector.

The best example is the non-availability of data on enrolment in private unrecognized schools, and even in alternate schools and EGS centres. Many countries have legislations on what data should be used as authentic figures for planning various development actions. It is time that India also sets up a commission on educational statistics with the authority to standardize the framework and process of data generation and consolidation on education in the country. This also requires strengthening the system of data collection at the field level and creating support systems for their analysis and use. Leaving this wholly to the teachers and district officials will not meet the requirement.

A related factor is the streamlining of entry age, critical if proper accounting of children in the school has to be ensured. This would probably take a long time. But unfortunately there is no standard policy on entry age in the country. While some states admit children to Grade I when they are barely five years old, others insist on completion of six years. The strategy of maintaining a village education register adopted under the SSA has the potential to streamline the school entry age over a period of time. With the constitutional amendment defining 6-14 as the compulsory school age group, it is now imperative that the government takes serious steps towards streamlining the age of entry into Grade I.

 

It is essential that five year plans do not become vehicles for fighting the fiscal crisis of state governments. Plan inputs should add value to the existing system in a cumulative fashion and incrementally transform the system over a period of time in the desired direction. As plan implementation progresses one should be able to clearly perceive an improvement in the system. Ad hoc measures cannot drive long-term progress. But, contingency measures seem to dominate the plan proposals, distorting not only the trajectory of progress but also the entire process of planning and budgeting. The appointment of para-teachers in several states using 10th plan funds is one such short-term strategy adopted essentially as a cost saving measure by many state governments.

Another overarching point that needs consideration is that of monitoring and concurrent evaluation of schemes and programmes. Though monitoring and evaluation is mentioned in a routine fashion in every plan document, adequate attention has not been paid to this aspect. The DIET scheme for reorganization of teacher education introduced in the 8th plan is one such example. No serious effort was made to review and reform the scheme in the 9th and 10th plans even though field observations as well as evaluation studies pointed to many problems. Similarly, evaluation of the Operation Blackboard (OBB) Scheme brought out many issues. For instance, proliferation of schools that do not conform to the norms adopted by the OBB has completely nullified the advantages gained through the programme. Has this been heeded in the implementation of SSA?

 

In conclusion, it appears that governments are heavily preoccupied with reporting progress in terms of expansion of schooling facilities and coverage of children in the relevant age group. This supply-oriented approach to development of elementary education has, to a large extent, resulted in inadequate attention towards critical processes that could make a significant difference in improving the internal and external efficiency of the school system. What is the extent of efforts made during the plan period to improve management of schools and teaching-learning processes in the classroom? Are schools functioning better now than earlier? What efforts have been made to make functional decentralization a reality, particularly in educationally backward states? Have any improvements in the utilization of resources at the sub-district and school levels taken place? What state specific interventions have been taken to improve internal efficiency of elementary education?

Developmental efforts during the 11th plan need to focus more on these aspects, rather than on quantitative indicators. Even from cursory observation, it is clear that states which have addressed such issues relating to UEE in the last decade have registered greater progress that is sustainable in the long run than those who have invested their attention mainly on improving quantitative targets. The two must go hand in hand; quantitative progress without attending to processes and outcomes would in the long run only lead to unviable and unproductive structures.

 

Footnotes:

1. Tenth Five-Year Plan (2002-2007) Volume I –Dimensions and Strategies, Planning Commission, GOI, New Delhi, 2002, Chapter 1, p.1

2. Education For All, Government of India, MHRD, New Delhi, November 2005.

3. M. Haq and K. Haq, Human Development in South Asia, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 1998.