1. What will a switch from 10+2 to a 5+3+3+4 structure mean in Schooling and beyond?
The claims of the NEP 2020 that the old structure was 10+2 are simplistic and ahistorical; and its proposal for a new structure as 5+3+3+4 are pedagogically and socially damaging and politically betraying the nation as they will further weaken the RTE. Actually, over time, particularly after the legislation of RTE Act (2009), the school structure had evolved into 8+2+2: while the Pre-Primary Education of the age group of 3-6 years was not integrated as a fundamental right, there was continuous assessment but no conventional exams up to 8th standard. Sociology of Education has repeatedly demonstrated that more than assessment, examination is an instrument of selection, ‘pushing-out’ and exclusion. Still, amending one of the progressive provisions of the RTE Act in the form of continuous assessment of children, the Union Government of the NDA-II have already allowed states to conduct conventional exam after classes 5 and 8. Now the NEP 2020 proposes to hold exams by the ‘competent authority’ in class III itself. Accordingly, now there is a separate cluster in the newly proposed structure, which is for classes 3rd to 5th in the age group of 8 to 11. It was expected that the NEP 2020 will take care of preschool education of children in the age group of 3 to 6 as a fundamental right and it will establish the new school structure as 3+8+4. However, it proposes the new structure as 5+3+3+4. Although the NEP 2020 claims to integrate 3 years of Pre-Primary Education with the first two years of Primary Education, neither it has been visualized as a fundamental right, nor any promise to amend the RTE Act has been made in this regard. NEP 2020 only expects the universalization of ECCE by 2030. Progressive sounding rhetoric of DNEP 2020 might be at best viewed as lofty announcements, because it is made clear there itself that these stages are ‘purely curricular and pedagogical’ and ‘parallel changes to physical infrastructure will not be required’. Accordingly, the Anganwadis and other ECCE centers will be part of the ‘School Complexes’, not the school as such. Thus, government schools are not conceptualized as having a Pre-Primary section. On the other hand, many private schools provide Pre-Primary Education. Therefore, owing to the retention of this structural gap at the entry level in the public system of education, parents will continue to be compelled to choose private schools.
Even though the proposal is that hard separation in different streams (such as arts, sciences or commerce) will be done away with in the Secondary Education, in the proposed structure, children will be required to exercise their Choice of study specific courses and modules two years earlier than under the old structure. In a way, they will have to decide about their future career at the age of 14. One wonders whether it is not too much to expect from a 14-year-old after passing in the 8th standard to take such decisions. On the contrary, an anxiety is that a lot of underprivileged might be pushed back into their traditional roles through professional education or skill education programmes because of this quite early selection. On the other hand, they might get themselves de-motivated because of the withdrawal or weankening of reservation provisions in Higher Education: NEP 2020 favoring merit is silent on this issue.
2. How will the 'mother tongue' at primary levels affect learning outcomes?
Certainly, it would be more advantageous to adopt mother-tongues situated in multilingual context as the medium of education at every level of education. All languages are in principle capable of being utilized for knowledge production and transmission at all levels, not merely in Primary Education. Wherever due to socio-historical and political reasons, specific languages have not acquired appropriate scripts or vocabulary, they can do so if facilitated and encouraged.
The recommendation of NEP 2020 for mother-tongue as the medium of Education up to class-5 th and preferably up to class 8th is not a new feature, rather it makes significant but veiled compromise. The RTE Act 2009 has already prescribed Mother-Tongue as the medium of Elementary Education (from class 1st to 8th). NEP 2020 reduces it cleverly to class 5th; and it merely expresses the preference for using Mother-tongue up to class 8th as the medium of Education. Both, the RTE Act 2009 as well as the NEP 2020 introduced compromising provisos to the use of Mother-tongue as medium of Education. While the RTE act said ‘in so far as practicable’, the NEP 2020 says ‘except where not possible’. If the NEP 2020 has explicitly brought under the purview of this recommendation the public as well as the private schools, the RTE Act also did not make any such distinction in this regard. However, these 3 provisos have made it possible in the past and will continue in the future to allow schools to introduce English as the medium of Elementary Education.
Although the NEP 2020 sometimes uses the term ‘multilinguality’, it actually refers to ‘fixed’ languages. NEP 2020 sees Language mainly as a medium of communication and marker of cultural identity, while language is an integral part of human existence; and each language is to be seen as a unique treasure of knowledge and wisdom. In this sense, language has crucial material side as well while NEP 2020 emphasizes only the cultural side.
Contrary to a lot of research findings, the NEP 2020 wrongly views all Indian languages as descendants of Sanskrit. Therefore, the NEP 2020 shows at many levels special interest in promotion of Sanskrit while giving tokenistic importance to Persian and no recognition to Urdu. In fact, heavy Sanskritization of many modern Indian languages has been already recognized as a problem distancing these languages from the spoken colloquial of the masses.
The NEP 2020 proposes for constituting a national institute of translation & interpretation (NITI) and academies for different languages. However, this reflects a unitary conception of a centralize institution while careful handling of language question in a country like India requires a federal model of national translation commission.
NEP 2020 emphasizes need to promote teaching-learning and research in regional & local languages even beyond elementary education up to university Education. However, until centralize test for admissions to different study programmes in Higher Education, such as NEET & JEE will continue and until there are centralized boards, pressures on the learners to learn larger languages of power and to read centrally produced textbooks such as the ones produced by the NCERT will continue to increase. If, the overall focus remains on national knowledge and national language, the promotion of Mother-tongue as medium of Education merely at the primary level is bound to fail. Through the proposals for the establishment of Parakh and NTA, NEP 2020 is actually going to increase centralization at every level of education. History tells us that until we stop seeing mother tongue only useful for early education of children on account of pedagogic reasons and we do not address the larger political questions on language inequality, all such policies are bound to fail to yield desired results.
3. Where are the funds?
History of education tells us that all the developed nations of today started funding public systems of equitable quality universal education as soon as they embarked on the path of industrialization and nation-building, because they realized that education is a capital: socio-economic, political and cultural. The question of funds is less about financial statistics and more about the lack of political will: it is related to our priorities and understanding of the significance of education. It is about the habit of asking before sanctioning and launching any particular expensive programme whether the involved expenditure is more necessary than education of children and youth? We will then realize that there was no need to take loans from World Bank or any other national or international agency for Elementary/Primary Education under DPEP, SSA and now STARS or to make Higher Education a tradable commodity as per the dictates of WTO-GATS: we have more than enough possibilities of funding our public system of education at the tune of 10 % of GDP (to fill the cumulative gap since the recommendation of 6 % by the Kothari Commission in 1964). We need to first get out of the ‘structural adjustment’ map of the World Bank and the IMF, because by deciding to pay for the education of only those from the state-exchequer who cannot afford, the state segregates their education system from those of the dominant and decision-making classes. Therefore, the ordinary government institutions are made to suffer with chronic deficiency of funds and elite institutions get due financial allocation under different pretexts like ‘Institute of Eminence/Center of Excellence and separate schools of so-called meritorious students and government employees. Equitable distribution of funds amongst different institutions must be ensured: in fact, contrary to the recommendations of NEP 2020 to link the funding with NAAC score, there is a need to follow the principle of ‘progressive discrimination’ in favor of backward institutions for their improvement.
There is no scarcity of funds in a rich country like India overwhelmed with poor population: the real problem lies in high levels of inequality. The government procures money through GST and Education cess which is paid by even the poorest person in a country where more than 75 % people live on less than 20 Rupees a day. Now the government should levy One percent education tax on top one percent of the most prosperous class which has acquired more than 70 % of the total wealth of our nation through the labor and skills of people on whom state has spent directly or indirectly. Government should withdraw incentive’s in the form of tax exemptions to corporate houses and direct this money to education budget: providing better educated human power would be a better and sustainable incentives instead of short-term policy of tax waivers. CSR funds of corporate houses should be directly procured by the state: most of them anyhow outsource them; and a substantial portion of this money must be invested in education. Dealing with the problem of corruption with a stern hand would be necessary: contractualization of different services and ‘public private partnership (PPP)’ has created a whole machinery of corruption from top-to-bottom in the name of commission. Reimbursement to private schools under the provisions of the RTE Act or on any other ground such as PPP will have to be stopped because in this manner, not only public funds are siphonedto private schools, it also helps to create mania for private schools.
Part of the budget of Public Works Department (PWD) should be earmarked for the building and maintenance of educational infrastructure. Similarly, in order to actually provide pre-primary education, the funds of Anganwadi and other centers of ECCE (currently under the ministry of women and Child Welfare) might be partly earmarked for education. Likewise, certain funds of the ministry of SJE may be specified for education. A certain portion of the funds of each MLA/MP should be mandatorily spent on education. Possible reduction in the perks and benefits to public representatives and bureaucrats and their highly exuberant meetings must be explored. Reduction in defence expenditure is another possible area to be explored.
4. What qualitative, concrete changes will the proposed overhaul of higher education bring?
Notwithstanding all rhetoric in NEP 2020 favoring autonomy of higher educational institutions (HEIs) and the rights of state government in a federal polity, it seeks to achieve greater centralization and control over Higher Education and ‘light but tight’ regulation by a single regulator through the establishment of the Higher Education Commission of India (HECI) and its four verticals, the National Higher Education Regulatory Council (NHERC), the National Accreditation Council (NAC), the Higher Education Grants Council (HEGC) and the General Education Council (GEC). HEIs will be the single window for all kinds of clearance and imposition of all kinds of instructions. The GEC will even intervene in the programme of studies in the HEIs in the name of ‘A National Higher Education Qualification Framework’, ‘expected learning outcomes’ and ‘value education’. The state and its allied corporate interests would control and decide the direction of research through National Research Foundation (NRF) in the name of funding outstanding peer-reviewed research, to actively seed research in universities and colleges and to establish synergy amongst different research works from outside. The independent boards and the Board of Governors filled with the outside elements of market and the think tanks of ruling establishment like the RSS would replace the existing bodies like the Academic Council and Executive Council of teachers.
The stage-wise programme of granting graded autonomy to colleges through a system of graded accreditation would convert better performing HEIS (generally the bastions of elites) into separate universities leaving the parent universities to consist of mainly the poor colleges. Such universities will in turn become discredited and closed down as has been already happening with government schools of ordinary category. As a result of the approach of NEP 2020 for granting greater funding to better performing institutions, the mass of ordinary institutions will become even more starved of funding. This will increase inequality in the system leading to the closure of most of the public HEIS. It is what the Niti Ayog had already called the ‘output measurement approach’.
The emphasis of NEP 2020 on bigger HEIS and multidisciplinary clusters capable of enrolling thousands of students is not merely based on ahistorical assumptions about ancient Indian universities, but it is clearly an attempt to make these viable investment areas for big corporate houses; and it is against the smaller HEIS born out of diverse historical struggles with specific academic objectives. This interpretation is further validated by another statement in NEP 2020 that ‘Single-stream HEIs will be phased out over time’.
The proposed system of multiple exit points is not only contrary to the stated objective of NEP 2020 to provide holistic and multidisciplinary education, but it is an attempt to mask the drop-out. Contrary to a progressive approach of making requisite and concrete arrangements to ensure that students are able to complete their studies, the NEP 2020 follows a negative approach of legitimizing students failures without realizing that it is usually difficult, particularly for the underprivileged and women to get back to their studies once moved into the world of employment.
In the name of institutional choice, the NEP 2020 allows for four-year degree as well as three-year degree for graduation; and similarly, one-year degree as well as two-year degree for post-graduation. This will create unnecessary confusion and also a lot of complexity with regards to eligibility qualification required for specific job opportunities. It is also going to be compounded if NEP’s suggestion for multiple exit points is accepted. If the NDA-III is now proposing for four-year degree programme, why did the NDA-III abolished the FYUP which was introduced during the previous UPA government in Delhi University?
While at one hand, the new structure will expect the child to exercise some choice with in a curriculum of general studies at the level of Secondary Education, on the other hand, he/shewill be required to acquire wholesome learning during graduation despite whatever subject specialization is chosen by him/her. In this context, reducing Masters degree to one-year programme and scratching M.Phil. altogether will further weaken subject specific knowledge of students. The in-depth subject knowledge is essential for quality research. Therefore, this proposed structure will be damaging for all subjects, but humanities and arts will be particularly impacted upon very heavily.
5. How will the entry of foreign institutions change/affect higher education?
Through the rhetoric of restoring India’s status of a ‘vishva guru’ and by making the illusory promise of providing ‘affordable’ ‘international education at home’, the NEP 2020 allows the entry of almost unregulated foreign universities in ‘atmanirbhar bharat’ actually to fulfill the agenda of WTO-GATS for making trade in higher education possible. The provisions of NEP 2020 formulated by NDA-III with regards to inviting foreign universities are similar to the bill presented by the UPA government ten years ago. That framework in turn was in line with the offer of the NDA Government made to WTO under GATS in 2004 surrendering Higher Education as a tradable commodity wherein public and private universities are to be treated at par and all foreign investors are also to be given a level playing field in a competitive sphere with very little regulation. Public institutions will have to gradually reduce their expenditure on many counts in order to give the private foreign investors a level playing field. They will need to adopt strictly merit based criterions and dilute social justice provisions. Although there is one conditionality that these foreign universities will have to invest their surplus (if any) within education sector only and will not transfer it outside the country, this is in no way an enough check on them to exploit huge profit. In due course of time, they will be able to (and even allowed for) transferring their profit elsewhere: the documents of Planning Commission and its newer incarnation the Neeti Ayog have repeatedly taken a favorable position for profit-making institutions in the field of education.
Regular academic interaction amongst researchers beyond the national boundaries is imperative for universal development of knowledge and human predicament, but it is nothing new. It has been already happening through academic journals and books, seminars, admissions and appointment across universities and research collaborations to the extent that sometimes our intellectuals are criticized for their anglophone predisposition and their distance from the concerns and perspective of the local. Now the private universities are extenuating this disparagement of the indigenous talent and knowledge by their emphasis on the appointment of foreign returned professors. The efforts of the state should be geared to ensure that each university should be made the space for the acquisition and production of all types of knowledge, universal, national and local with equal respect by supporting short-term and long-term exchange programmes, by sponsoring overseas research visits, and by ensuring accessibility to global academic knowledge. Instead of this, the NEP 2020 seeks to further augment the mania for foreign degrees which is uncalled for. It will further enhance inequality in the sphere of education, discredit domestic system, detach education from grassroot concerns and separat the language of academic discourse and intellectuals from the languages of masses.
The exposure that one receives when one goes overseas for a study programme is not possible when foreign universities come to India. Still, the trade in the degrees of foreign universities through educational loans will increase the stranglehold in a situation where the level of stress and the regretful incidents of suicides are already pretty high. If seen in light of other provisions of the NEP 2020, in these foreign universities, teachers and students will have no say in decision making. These will further alienate higher educational knowledge, teaching and research from Indian languages and local traditions. Given the mania for the degree received from foreign universities and the prestige of employment in them, there will be exodus of talent from public institutions to foreign universities. Public institutions will be left to serve the underprivileged. Foreign universities will form a higher stratum within an already iniquitous system and this will become an additional cause of the ruin of public institutions in the country.
Vikas Gupta Professor, department of history, Faculty of Social Sciences, Delhi University
