Politics of Education in India

A Perspective from Below

Ramdas Rupavath, Ramdas Rupavath

• Publisher: Routledge India
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781000601145
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

This book studies the state of tribal education in India. India has the single largest tribal population in the world, yet the tribal community remains one of the most economically impoverished and marginalized groups in the country.

The volume:

• Examines the educational status of the tribal population and studies developmental issues such as unemployment, illiteracy, caste discrimination, and inequality faced by the community
• Studies the implementation and execution of welfare schemes, initiatives, and reforms in place to tackle issues faced by tribal students and identifies loopholes in the various centrally sponsored schemes
• Emphasizes the importance of the Right to Education Act and presents policy implications for the educational uplift of India's very many millions of tribal people

A critical study of the Indian education system, this book will be indispensable to students and researchers of education, education policy, minority studies, indigenous studies, sociology of education, and South Asian studies.

Section II
Tribal Education
Achievements and Challenges

2 Community Participation in the Framework of DecentralizationMove towards Local Self-Governance

Sunita Chugh and Charu Smita Malik

DOI: 10.4324/9780429285523-4

The changing face of Indian school education within the framework of decentralization of educational management has emphasized the enhanced role of community in improving school processes. The education reforms, begun by either the government or the non-government sector, have all established the fact that the community is one of the most significant stakeholders for school improvement and transformation. Going back to the community for improving the school system can be associated with the process of decentralization in recent times, but it has its roots in the long and chequered tradition of local-level institutions, private efforts, and community-led education in India. The post-Independence period witnessed an altogether different phenomenon on the ground. With the virtual control of primary education by the state, schools became totally alienated from the community they served. Gradually, in response to mounting criticism against the failure of centralized structures and approaches of educational governance, various government reports and policies (National Policy on Education 1968, 1986; Programme of Action 1992) started advocating for an education system that was more responsive and accountable to the community. Therefore, community participation became a major agenda of discussion in the country in the mid-1980s when decentralization began to be recognized as an important component of educational reform and change processes. Community participation in the Indian education system has currently been operationalized and studied through community-based formal structures, such as the Village Education Committees, parent–teacher associations, mother–teacher associations, school development management committees, etc., which are linked with the larger government policy of decentralization for encouraging local governance and its impact on the education system for enabling school-based management. The present chapter charts the notion of community in the Indian scenario and explains how community participation has been viewed as a vehicle for universalization of education and bringing reforms in the school system. It also recounts experiences in various states with a shift in educational governance.

Introduction

The link between school and community has been explored in many contexts, in terms of both the role of communities in the learning of children and management and supervision of schools and how the school impacts community processes. A sustained dialogue between the school and the community gives the latter a sense of school ownership and the school is less seen as something outside the community. Though these linkages run deep and wide, often they are denoted by the term ‘community participation’, which includes a host of ways of working together within formal or informal structures and processes.

Community participation as a whole has been considered as an important vehicle for promoting education (UNICEF 1992), bringing together different stakeholders for problem-solving and decision-making (Talbot and Verrinder 2005, cited in Aref 2010), garnering support for educational planning and development (Cole 2007, cited in Aref 2010), and promoting quality of life (Putnam 2000). When school–community relationships are strong, problem-solving and educational innovation can emerge as a team effort, enhancing the chances for student success. These linkages are also found to support and uphold local culture, tradition, knowledge, and skill, and create pride among children in community heritage. The goal of any kind of activity that attempts to involve community and parents/families in education is to improve the educational delivery so that more children learn better and are well prepared for the changing world. Participation is also necessary to adapt education to the needs, problems, aspirations, and interests of all sections of the population, especially the weaker sections. Participation is a prerequisite for the democratization of education, especially in the perspective of achieving equal opportunity.

While school practices for building linkages with the community might have yielded desired results in the international contexts, the researches cited above point to limited success. In the Indian scenario, effective involvement of community still remains a moot question. One of the major recommendations made by the National Policy on Education (NPE) 1986 was related to empowering communities for the management of educational institutions at the local level. The NPE recommended the establishment of an appropriate institutional framework at the district and sub-district levels, such as the District Board of Education and Village Education Committee, in order to ensure that the community members play an important role in the management of primary education. The move towards decentralization and empowerment of community got a further fillip with the 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments relating to Panchayati Raj institutions. The National Policy on Education 1986 and Programme of Action 1992 recommended not only promoting participation of the community in primary education but also a shift towards empowering the local community to take major management decisions in this regard. In pursuance of the Policy and Programme of Action, the state governments had taken steps to set up structures for decentralized planning and management. It was envisaged that as part of the decentralization, local communities through appropriate bodies would get involved in the management and functioning of schools. The formation of the Village Education Committee (VEC) and various other participatory structures and their involvement in education is the result of constitutional commitment and policy recommendations. With greater emphasis on decentralization and community participation in the 1990s, the education sector at the national as well as the state levels began to experiment with various approaches to involve the local bodies and community. They started encouraging the delegation of power to schools, lower-level government offices, and elected bodies, thus providing opportunities for local citizens to participate in the management of schools. The shift from participation to engagement began in early 2000 and it was clearly articulated in the implementation framework of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) that the success of SSA will depend on the quality of the community-based planning process. Further impetus was given in the Right to Education Act (RTE) Act 2009 and RMSA guidelines that emphasized School Management Committees/School Development Management Committees need to be constituted in each school, which would be actively engaged in the planning, monitoring, and implementation of the school-based activities. In this context, the chapter makes an attempt to trace the history of involvement of community participation in education and discuss the various programmes that have structured community participation in school education.

Notion of Community in India

Much of the educational literature in the Indian scenario defines ‘community’ in the context of either a defined geographical area such as the village, or in terms of persons who inhabit that area, such as parents and/or community elders. The community is nowhere considered as a homogeneous entity, as it comprises individuals who have different affiliations, such as those based on caste–class differences. But they are usually found to uphold some common cultural beliefs, norms, and customs. In educational discourse, three categories of community membership can be found to be prominent – the ‘parents’, ‘the larger community’, and ‘elected representatives’ (Noronha 2003) – and its involvement in matters of the school that is within the local surr...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of tables
• Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword
• Abbreviations
• SECTION I Introduction: A Historical Perspective
• SECTION II Tribal Education: Achievements and Challenges
• SECTION III Politics of Tribal Education: Intervention of State and Non-State Actors
• SECTION IV Approaches to Tribal Education
• Glossary
• Index