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India can never be a great power unless illiteracy is wiped out

Francis Bacon had once declared that knowledge is power. It is today clear that if ever India wants to be a player of some consequence in the world, it can never do so unless all, repeat all, its citizens are literate and knowledgeable. Alas, the government seems ill prepared for the challenge. In India we today have an outdated and useless system of education that prepares quantity, not quality. And even the quantity is not enough because half of India remains illiterate. The money spent by the government is simply wasted in a system that is ill equipped to help India and Indians achieve a higher goal.

Schools are free, but there are too few schools in the villages to make a dent on illiteracy. The government constantly pleads its lack of resources to set up more schools in the villages. And municipal and government primary schools already set up are so pathetic that no middle class parents will ever want their children to attend them. So the choice is for private education at an affordable price. With the middle classes' strong voice not available, government schools only languish further -- bad teachers, bad facilities, fewer and fewer students.

Then the students go to universities and colleges that are for the most part free (in the United States, students' lives are the opposite; they go to free schools and pay for college). In the 1980s, it was estimated that the Indian government spent Rs 200,000 per year per student enrolled in the IIT, the country's premier technology institutes. Yet, huge numbers of IIT students migrated out after completing their course, which effectively meant that precious money had been simply been lost. How many primary schools with decent facilities (such as blackboards, roofs, benches, toilets, and dedicated teachers) could have been set up with the money over the years is virtually incalculable.

This is not to condemn those who left (many of whom return later on). But why could the government not have charged the students at IIT? If a particular student could not pay, ensure that he or she is given a bank loan at a zero or low interest rate, to be repaid after his education is complete. Thus, the students could go abroad but certainly, few would mind sending home a few dollars to pay back an outstanding loan. IITs attract arguably India's finest brains, and securing a loan for them should never be a problem. In fact, the government can and should pass a law that no student, in any higher course, is to be denied a bank loan for higher studies.

There is another factor of our education policy and it is the emphasis on securing a degree. The real culprit for this is the government of India. Take for example, government recruitment. The government has four cadres, unimaginatively called A, B, C, and D. The last is for the menial workers (office boys, peons, cleaners, etc), who need to have cleared school (Class 10).

Cadre C is the clerical staff, cadre B the officer staff, and cadre A the top executive staff (for which the much sought after civil services exams have to be given). Now while it may be necessary to have graduates for Cadre B and A, why on earth is it necessary to be a graduate in any subject such as biology, zoology, geology, history, physics, chemistry, or you-name-it to join Cadre C where one just makes certain notings and jottings on administrative files? Do we really need to force a needy person to acquire a degree for which he will have no further use ever again just to be clerk? This is a monstrous waste of time, money and talent.

It also explains why the government's initiative to push up vocational courses, diploma courses and other non-formal education has failed. Simply because the students who do such courses have very limited job opportunities available. Hence, only if one is guaranteed employment (usually a businessman's son) one will take up such a course, any other person (poor or middle class) will only seek a course which offers him or her the maximum opportunity. This happens to be a degree, in any field, howsoever irrelevant to your final employment needs (how useful is it to know the inside of an earthworm as a clerk in the electricity billing department?).

To make matters worse, after doing a vocational course, further studies for those who are interested are not available, nor the pursuit of formal education. In today's fast-changing world, where persons may need to acquire further knowledge, such rigidity in Indian education rules is patently anachronistic.

Hence, the obsession with acquiring a formal degree. Tragically after graduation, thousands of students join the labour force with no specialised or marketable skill. They become drifters and wasters. To make matters worse, many go in for further studies such as a master's degree or law, only because they have nothing better to do! In fact, it was to curb this distressing tendency of uninterested students taking up law only to pass their time that the government introduced the five-year law course right after class 12 (intermediate). It hopes to cut down post-graduate law courses and on uninterested students.

What is worse is that in India, even master's degrees are subsidised. And the subsidy goes right up to the doctorate level. Today, many students do their masters and their doctorates only because it costs them nothing and gives them an excuse not to start working. Worse, students pursue courses to avail of hostel facilities, which, again are subsidised to ridiculous levels. These student spend the country's precious resources whiling away their time, playing politics, on a long free vacation with virtually no responsibilities save clearing the exams once a year. In India, there are no assignments, no project work, no research work involved even at the masters level.

In fact, students go right for the masters immediately after doing their bachelors without even knowing what jobs they are going to take up and whether the course has any relevance. Others take up masters but only prepare for their civil (why should they do a masters for it is still questionable). Only a few do it genuinely as they want more knowledge. Is it any wonder that many of our worthies who finally boast a master's degree often know so little about their own subject. They can easily reproduce what is in the text-books but can rarely think for themselves about the subject.

It is time our planners gave serious thought to education. There is no need to subsidise higher education, because that only attracts the riff-raff rather than the serious students. The aim should be to make higher education available only to those who are genuinely interested. As mentioned above, let soft loans and grants be available to all students genuinely desirous of greater knowledge, loans that can be repaid. This will ensure that higher education is available to all regardless of wealth status, but also curb the uninterested. Anything free is unappreciated. Once the students pay for their education, they will treat it with greater respect than they do at present.

And the government would do well to spend the money thus saved on primary education. So that we may no longer have the dubious distinction of having the world's greatest number of illiterates! Thus, by diverting funds to primary education, we can wipe out illiteracy. And by charging for higher education, we will ensure that the students actually study their subjects and become an educated lot.

Let us remember that India can never aspire to great power status unless all its citizens can read and write, are aware of the times that we live in, and participate in the nation's destiny rather than be mere spectators.

Amberish K Diwanji