A large number of students passed the school leaving examination with flying colours. But the education system in India has all too obvious shortcomings. At school, students are sucked into a disciplinary triangle –science, commerce and humanities. There is a hierarchy- science at the top, commerce at the middle and humanities at the bottom. There is no effort to initiate students in the interlinking of different subjects. Endless lectures are inflicted on students and on top of that there are coaching classes. Group work is not encouraged and there is little scope for debate. College education is not all that better. India is about 50 years behind other countries in promoting interdisciplinary interaction and encouraging individual thinking. Minds are not structured. Even higher education is streamlined into crass uniformity.
Such narrow education needs to be scrapped. Marks or grades in examination papers mean little. That goes even for a subject like English literature. The stress should be on creative and logical thinking. The obsession with job oriented education can be misleading. Education should create a society capable of generating employment. Students should be given an impetus to look for solutions to problems and innovate. At the same time, the Centre and the State governments should go all out to provide low cost education. In India, the right to education is now a fundamental right. But it is only on paper. Except in Kerala, nowhere is there anything like 100% literacy. As for higher education, it cannot be low cost in terms of content and infrastructure but grants and scholarships should make it affordable. Has HRD Minister Kapil Sibal or for that matter a dedicated educationist like Amartya Sen enough time to sort out the problem?
