Social Stigma Of Dowry System

In the good old days dowry comprised the number of voluntary gifts or donations given by the parents and relatives of bride to the bridegroom so that the newly wed couple could settle their home.

It was considered as a partial fulfillment of needs required during early part of marital life. But the concept of dowry has undergone a drastic changes. The gifts witch used to be given on voluntary basis to the bride are demanded on a huge scale by the groom.

The parents of bride are compelled to fulfill the enormous necessities, amenities and luxuries. The solemn and happy occasion of marriage has now been changed to ritual of spendthrift and costly compulsion. The menace of dowry has greatly harmed its sanctity of union of two souls.

The present form of dowry system seems to have evolved due to increasing trend of materialism and the greedy nature of modern man . The lust to acquire money through easy methods seem to increase the trend and quantum of dowry.

It has not only become the custom of the rich but the poor are also expected to follow similar traditions. The plite of the have-nots is precarious. They are compelled to borrow, beg or steal to fulfill the demands of in-laws of their daughter.

The dowry system has turned to be a social stigma mainly due to moral degradation and downfall in spiritual values. The ill effects of this evil are evident on our society and some of these attract our attention which need immediate remedial measures.

Remedial measures :-

• Dowry system has greatly damaged the social status of women and degraded the high sounding tradition of our country.


• The marriages seem to have because commercial bargains. The bride and grooms of different castes, status and ranks are bought with specific prices. Doctors, engineers , officers , armed force personals etc have their own values.


• Dowry system breeds corruption, bribery and crimes.


• Maltreatment of brides with the family of in laws. The girls are sometimes harassed of tortured to the extent of their taking extreme stop of compelled suicide .


• The heinous crime of bride burning is also in the news.


• Certain cases of suicides are observed when the parents of their girls are unable to reach to the expectations of bride groom’s family.


• Prenatal abortion of female child also seems to be the root cause of the increasing levels of dowry.


• Unhappy family life has ruined the amicable relations.


• Increasing cases of divorce due to increasing hatred and frustration.


• Many girls are unable to find their life partner due to insufficient arrangement of dowry.


• Sometimes, the girl of high physical, mental and educational status has to marry a groom of relatively lower status. This breeds quarrels and ultimate separation.

With the passage of time, the right thinking persons have come to realize that if this evil menace is not checked, it is likely to engulf the very social system of harmonious matrimony.

A few reliable methods are suggested to end the monster of dowry system :-

• Provide equal status to the women in our society and thus revive the age old tradition of due regards and high esteem to the ladies.


• Consider marriage as a sacred ceremony that involves union of two souls.


• Revive the moral values of respect and love among the families of bride and bridegroom.


• Follow the guidelines and sermons of holy saints who always preach for love and amity for each other , harmony in the family, shun the greed for wealth, try to live on the self-earned income. The saints clearly explain that taking or giving dowry is not only a social evil but also a personal sin. Any attempt to tease or hurt the feelings of fellow beings brings moral degradation which becomes hinderance in spiritual emancipation.


• The system of simple marriage (without dowry) is totally implemented at Dera Sacha Sauda with blessings of His Holiness Saint Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh Ji Insan.


• Development of strong will power among the youth to give or accept dowry can play an important role. Many cases have been reported where the prospective brides have refused to marry particular persons who intend to demand dowry. Such praiseworthy determination should be encouraged and given proper coverage in the newspapers.


• The dowry prohibition act has been promulgated since 1961. The law should be implemented in true sense and spirit. It should be modified and amended according to the present circumstances to deal strictly with the offenders.


• Social organizations should launch a massive campaign to bye-cot the menace of dowry system.


• The girls should adopt to the job oriented courses of education. They should try to be self reliant and independent in their earnings.


• Boys & Girls should be educated to lead a life of dignity blended with love for younger and respect for elders.

Therefore, joint, collective, concerted and determined efforts of the parents, youth, social organizations, and kind blessings of saints the government can bring culmination of the dreaded menace of Dowry system. It is sincerely hoped that the coming generation shall live happily by putting an end to this social stigma

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Introduction to Demonetization in India and Its Status

Introduction to Demonetization in India and Its Status

So, what the demonetization? As per “Investopedia“, a demonetization is an act of removing the legal status of currency as “Legal Tender”. Means old notes or even coins must be retired and replaced with new ones or completely new currency can be introduced like Rs. 2000 note which was not available earlier.

On 8^th November, PM Modi’s announcement was the breaking news across India. Rs.500 and Rs. 1000 notes (currency) are made illegal from a stroke of midnight. One might think, why it’s been done? Indian government’s goal was to remove all counterfeit (fake) currency from the market which is used in tax evasion, corruption and even in funding terrorist activities. These two currency notes are the most used currency in the Indian market, it had 86% share in the market. This was a very big and risky decision and as some aptly said it is a “Masterstroke“. Some even say it is a “Surgical Attack” on black money. In simple words, old Rs 500 and Rs. 1000 notes are worthless now, they are just a piece of paper.

The opposite of demonetization is remonetisation, which means restoring the demonetized currency as legal tender. And a lot of political parties from the opposition are fighting for it.

Impact of demonetization within India and foreign Relations

Demonetization has a big impact on Indian market and citizens like you and me. People flocked the banks to changed their currency and stood in long lines in front of bank and ATMs for hours to draw their money. Surely, we have problems in but we also need to understand the importance of it. Just imagine if it was told a month ago, then all black money launderers could have managed their money in this or that form. That’s why it has to be a sudden and surprise act.

Conclusion

To sum up everything, I would say; demonetization was a really a masterstroke. It will help in fighting against corruption, black money, and tax evasion. I as Indian stand strongly behind this move. Though all good said about this, I think the way it was planned and handled could have been better. Otherwise, I support the demonetization.

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Clean India Mission Essay

Swachh Bharat Abhiyan

Introduction
Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is started by the government to make India a completely clean India. Clean India was a dream seen by the Mahatma Gandhi regarding which he said that, “Sanitation is more important than Independence”. During his time he was well aware of the poor and dirty condition of the country that’s why he made various efforts to complete his dream however could not be successful. As he dreamt of clean India a day, he said that both cleanliness and sanitation are integral parts of healthy and peaceful living. Unfortunately, India became lack of cleanliness and sanitation even after 67 years of independence. According to the statistics, it has seen that only few percentage of total population have access to the toilets. It is a programme run by the government to seriously work to fulfill the vision of Father of Nation (Bapu) by calling the people from all walks of life to make it successful globally.
This mission has to be completed by 150^th birth anniversary of Bapu (2^nd October of 2019) in next five years (from the launch date). It is urged by the government to people to spend their only 100 hours of the year towards cleanliness in their surrounding areas or other places of India to really make it a successful campaign. There are various implementation policies and mechanisms for the programme including three important phases such as planning phase, implementation phase and sustainability phase.
What is Swachh Bharat Abhiyan
Swachh Bharat Abhiyan is a national cleanliness campaign established by the Government of India. This campaign is covering 4041 statutory towns in order to clean roads, streets, and infrastructure of the India. It is a mass movement has run to create a Clean India by 2019. It is a step ahead to the Mahatma Gandhi’s dream of swachh Bharat for healthy and prosperous life. This mission was launched on 2^nd of October 2014 (145^th birth anniversary of Bapu) by targeting its completeness in 2019 on 150^th birth anniversary of Bapu. The mission has been implemented to cover all the rural and urban areas of the India under the Ministry of Urban Development and the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation accordingly.
The first cleanliness drive (on 25^th of September 2014) of this mission was started by the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi earlier to its launch. This mission has targeted to solve the sanitation problems as well as better waste management all over the India by creating sanitation facilities to all.
Need of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan
Swachh Bharat mission is very necessary to run continuously in India until it gets its goal. It is very essential for the people in India to really get the feeling of physical, mental, social and intellectual well being. It is to make living status advance in India in real means which can be started by bringing all over cleanliness. Below I have mentioned some points proving the urgent need of swachh bharat abhiyan in India:

• It is really very essential to eliminate the open defecation in India as well as making available toilets facility to everyone.


• It is needed in India to convert the insanitary toilets into flushing toilets.


• It is necessary in order to eradicate the manual scavenging system.


• It is to implement the proper waste management through the scientific processes, hygienic disposal, reuse, and recycling of the municipal solid wastes.


• It is to bring behavioral changes among Indian people regarding maintenance of personal hygiene and practice of healthy sanitation methods.


• It is to create global awareness among common public living in rural areas and link it to the public health.


• It is to support working bodies to design, execute and operate the waste disposal systems locally.


• It is to bring private-sector participation to develop sanitary facilities all through the India.


• It is to make India a clean and green India.


• It is necessary to improve the quality of life of people in rural areas.


• It is to bring sustainable sanitation practices by motivating communities and Panchayati Raj Institutions through the awareness programmes like health education.


• It is to bring the dream of Bapu to really come true.

Swachh Bharat Mission in Urban Areas
The swachh bharat mission of urban areas aims to cover almost 1.04 crore households in order to provide them 2.6 lakhs of public toilets, 2.5 lakhs of community toilets together with the solid wastes management in every town. Community toilets have been planned to be built in the residential areas where availability of individual household toilets is difficult and public toilets at designated locations including bus stations, tourist places, railway stations, markets, etc. Cleanliness programme in the urban areas (around 4,401 towns) have been planned to be completed over five years till 2019. The costs of programmes are set like Rs 7,366 crore on solid waste management, Rs 1,828 crore on public awareness, Rs 655 crore on community toilets, Rs 4,165 crore on individual household toilets, etc. Programmes which have been targeted to be completed are complete removal of open defecation, converting unsanitary toilets into flush toilets, eradicating manual scavenging, bring behavioral changes among public, and solid waste management.
Gramin Swachh Bharat Mission
Gramin swachh bharat mission is a mission implementing cleanliness programmes in the rural areas. Earlier the Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan (also called Total Sanitation campaign, TSC) was established by the Government of India in 1999 to make rural areas clean however now it has been restructured into the Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin). This campaign is aimed to make rural areas free of open defecation till 2019 for which the cost has been estimated is one lakh thirty four thousand crore rupees for constructing approximately 11 crore 11 lakh toilets in the country. There is a big plan of converting waste into bio-fertilizer and useful energy forms. This mission involves the participation of gram panchayat, panchayat samiti and Zila Parishad. Following are the objectives of Swachh Bharat Mission (Gramin):

• To improve quality of life of people living in the rural areas.


• Motivate people to maintain sanitation in rural areas to complete the vision of Swachh Bharat by 2019.


• To motivate local working bodies (such as communities, Panchayati Raj Institutions, etc) to make available the required sustainable sanitation facilities.


• Develop advance environmental sanitation systems manageable by the community especially to focus on solid and liquid waste management in the rural areas.


• To promote ecologically safe and sustainable sanitation in the rural areas.

Swachh Bharat-Swachh Vidyalaya Campaign
The swachh bharat swachh vidyalaya campaign runs by the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development having same objectives of cleanliness in the schools. A big programme was organized under it from 25^th of September 2014 to 31^st of October 2014 in the Kendriya Vidyalays and Navodaya Vidyalya Sangathans where lots of cleanliness activities were held such as discussion over various cleanliness aspects in the school assembly by the students, teachings of Mahatma Gandhi related to cleanliness, cleanliness and hygiene topics, cleaning activities (in the class rooms, libraries, laboratories, kitchen sheds stores, playgrounds, gardens, toilets, pantry areas, etc), cleaning of statue in the school area, speech over the contribution of great people, essay writing competition, debates, art, painting, film, shows, role plays related to hygiene including other many activities on cleanliness and hygiene. It has also been planned to held half an hour cleaning campaign in the schools twice a week involving the cleanliness activities by the teachers, students, parents and community members.
Conclusion
We can say swachh bharat abhiyan, a nice welcome step to the clean and green India till 2019. As we all heard about the most famous proverb that “Cleanliness is Next to Godliness”, we can say surely that clean India campaign (swachh bharat abhiyan) will really bring godliness all over the country in few years if it is followed by the people of India in effective manner. So, the cleanliness activities to warm welcome the godliness have been started but do not need to be ended if we really want godliness in our lives forever. A healthy country and a healthy society need its citizens to be healthy and clean in every walk of life.

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Save The Indian National Animal(Tiger) Essay

India is a Land of animals and Tiger is our National Animal.India is currently projecting itself to the world for the progress and revenue generation.But we as an human being were not even bothered about what is needed for wild life and conservation of wild animals.Current status of Tigers left is around 1400 and we are the one who is responsible. Decreasing numbers in tigers population has made a serious challenge for their survival.Conservation is needed for tigers so that national reserves will come forwards and safe guard their natural habitat. The article is dedicated for the survival of Tigers, the process to help and save our tigers which have only reserve left for their survival.India is a land where most of animal use to live in jungle and do to increase in population there is no forest left for animals to stay.Land is turned into industries for globalization and in turn land cannot be used for other purpose. As major part of Land is occupied for construction and agriculture, then half is covered form sea only left some of the Land is for animals.we have crossed our boundaries and cut down major forest areas and we want our lives to be settled in big buildings and apartments. Tigers are our national animals then why we were not thinking about them before as we have reached to end of a road and want to save them.The reserve where tigers are preserved are Ranthambore, Corbett, Kanha, Bandhavgarh.Others are also there but population is less there for Tigers. Save the tigers will help our tigers to be preserved India and will helping hands so please start blogging, write articles and help save the tigers.

Ways to preserve Tigers can be:

1. Plant more trees.


2. Conserve Rain Waters in terms of rain water harvesting.


3. Preserve forest areas and human beings not to enter forest.


4. Control Pollution and population.


5. Try to save food and do not waste as food is major problem of land conversation into agriculture. Major problem in today's world is no body want to save others as their time is reserved for growth and increments in their daily life.Think about others so that this world can become a peaceful place to live.

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Honor killing in India

An honor killing or honour killing (also called a customary killing) is the murder of a member of a family or social group by other members, due to the belief of the perpetrators (and potentially the wider community) that the victim has brought dishonour upon the family or community. Honour killings are directed mostly against women and girls. The perceived dishonor is normally the result of one of the following behaviors, or the suspicion of such behaviors:

1. dressing in a manner unacceptable to the family or community,


2. wanting to terminate or prevent an arranged marriage or desiring to marry by own choice,


3. engaging in heterosexual sexual acts outside marriage, or even due to a non-sexual relationship perceived as inappropriate, and


4. engaging in homosexual acts. Women and girls are killed at a much higher rate than men.

Recently, there has been a spate of honor killings in the country and this has led the government to decide what laws should be put in place to stop this heinous crime. Also whether the Hindu Marriage Act should be reformed or not is being debated. So what is the definition of honour killing and what leads families to commit this heinous crime so that they can protect their family honour? Is this practice prevalent only in India or is it prevalent in other parts of the world also? What are the misconceptions regarding honour killing and what are the solutions to stop this crime from spreading? These are the questions that society find the answer…

In my opinion Honour killing is defined as a death that is awarded to a woman of the family for marrying against the parent's wishes, having extramarital and premarital relationships, marrying within the same gotra or outside one's caste or marrying a cousin from a different caste. Honour killing is different from the dowry deaths that are also a very common practice in India as, in the case of dowry deaths, the perpetrators of that action claim that they have not been given enough material rewards for accepting the woman into the family. In that case there is a lot of harassment from the in-laws and more times than one, it has been noted that the wife commits suicide rather than being killed by the in-laws, though it has to be said that she has been mentally killed, if not physically. We have had a tradition of honour killing. This tradition was first viewed in its most horrible form during the Partition of the country in between the years 1947 and 1950 when many women were forcefully killed so that family honour could be preserved.

Now, there are various reasons why people or family members decide to kill the daughter in the name of preserving their family honour. The most obvious reason for this practice to continue in India, albeit, at a much faster and almost daily basis, is because of the fact that the caste system continues to be at its rigid best and also because people from the rural areas refuse to change their attitude to marriage. According to them, if any daughter dares to disobey her parents on the issue of marriage and decides to marry a man of her wishes but from another gotra or outside her caste, it would bring disrepute to the family honour and hence they decide to give the ultimate sentence, that is death, to the daughter. Now as has become the norm, the son-in-law is killed as well. Sociologists believe that the reason why honour killings continue to take place is because of the continued rigidity of the caste system. Hence the fear of losing their caste status through which they gain many benefits makes them commit this heinous crime. The other reason why honour killings are taking place is because the mentality of people has not changed and they just cannot accept that marriages can take place in the same gotra or outside one's caste. The root of the cause for the increase in the number of honour killings is because the formal governance has not been able to reach the rural areas and as a result. Thus, this practices continues though it should have been removed by now.

There are various misconceptions regarding the practice of honor killing. The first misconception about honor killing is that this is a practice that is limited to the rural areas. The truth is that it is spread over such a large geographical area that we cannot isolate honor killings to rural areas only, though one has to admit that majority of the killings take place in the rural areas. But it has also been seen recently that even the metropolitan cities like Delhi and Tamil Nadu are not safe from this crime because 5 honor killings were reported from Delhi and in Tamil Nadu; a daughter and son in law were killed due to marriage into the same gotra. So it can be seen clearly that honor killing is not isolated to rural areas but also to urban areas and as already pointed out, it has a very wide geographical spread. The second misconception regarding honor killing is that it has religious roots. Even if a woman commits adultery, there have to be four male witnesses with good behavior and reputation to validate the charge. Furthermore only the State can carry out judicial punishments, but never an individual vigilante. So, we can clearly see that there is no religious backing or religious roots for this heinous crime.

What can we do to prevent such a thing from happening? Firstly, the mentality of the people has to change. And when we say that the mentality has to change, we mean to say that parents should accept their children's wishes regarding marriage as it is they who have to lead a life with their life partners and if they are not satisfied with their life partner then they will lead a horrible married life which might even end in suicide. Secondly, we need to have stricter laws to tackle these kinds of killings as this is a crime which cannot be pardoned because. Humans do not have the right to write down death sentences of innocent fellow humans.

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Female Foeticide Essay

Introduction

Female foeticide is the elimination of girl child after sex determination test from the womb. Girl child is killed before birth just to fulfill the wishes of old members in the family of getting boy baby first. All the process gone under familial pressure especially by husband or in-laws. General reason behind abortion becomes unplanned pregnancy however female foeticide becomes planned by the families. It is the age old practice to kill ever unwanted girl child in the Indian society.

People believe that boys are the key to continue their family lineage however they do not understand the most simple thing that girls are reasons to give birth to new entity in the world not boys.

Reasons of Female Foeticide

Female foeticide is an unethical act has been practiced from old age due to some cultural norms and socio-economic policies. Following are the reasons of female foeticide in the Indian society:

• The important reason of female foeticide is the preference of male child over girl child because son is the main source of income however girls are consumer. There is a misconception in the society that boys are always look after their parents however girls are to left them away.


• Old custom of dowry system in India has put a big challenge before parents which is the main reason to avoid girl child by the parents.


• Low status of women in the male dominated Indian society.


• Parents consider that boys would carry their name ahead in the society however girls are only to handle households.


• Legalization of abortion in India is another big reason for the illegal sex determination and termination of girl baby.


• Technological advancement in the health sector has given fire to the female foeticide.

Effective Measures to Control:

As we all know that female foeticide is a crime and social disaster for the future of women. We should notice the reasons for female foeticide in the Indian society and try to solve one by one on regular basis. Female infanticide or female feticide is mainly because of the sex determination. There should be legal stoppage to get control over it. All the laws should be strictly followed by the every citizens of India. And one should be surely punished if found guilty for this cruel practice. Permanent termination of license should be done if found practicing this. Marketing of medical equipments especially for illegal sex determination and abortion should be stopped. Parents should be penalized who want to kill their girl baby. Campaigns and seminars should be regularly organized to aware young couples. Women should be empowered so that they can be more attentive to their rights.

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Problems Associated with Education in Rural Areas in India

The concept and phenomenon of education based on school-going is of modern origin in India. Education in the past was restricted to upper castes and the content taught was also ascriptive. However, today, to lead a comfortable life in this fast-changing world, education is seen as the most influential agent of modernization.

The educational attainments in terms of enrolment and retention in rural India gen­erally correspond to the hierarchical order. While the upper castes have traditionally enjoyed and are enjoying these advantages, the Scheduled Caste and other backward castes children have lagged behind in primary schooling. Studies have revealed that chil­dren of backward castes are withdrawn from school at an early age, by about 8 or 9 years.

An important reason for withdrawal of children from school is the cost and work needs of poor households. Income and caste are typically correlated with lower castes having lower incomes and higher castes having better endowments in terms of land, income and other resources. Thus, one fact is certain that there is a clear divide in the villages, along caste lines, regarding access to schools.

The very poor children are enrolled in the municipal school because it provides a number of incentives such as lower expenditure on books, uniforms, fees, etc. The well-off children go to the private school, where English and computers are given more importance.

The tendency in favour of private schools in rural areas is influenced by people’s perception of private schools, as a means of imparting quality education in English medium. The poor rural girls, if not all, con­stitute a major junk of disadvantaged groups that are excluded from the schooling pro­cess, especially because they enter late into school and drop out earlier.



Parental illiteracy is another cause for lack of interest to become literates. Many rural children enrolled are thus first generation learners, who come from illiterate families thus, they have to single handedly grapple with school life, mastering language and cog­nitive skills without parental help and guidance.

Most of these illiterate parents do what­ever is possible to educate their children because education for them acts as a vehicle of social mobility. Moreover, education and the subsequent attainment of town jobs is often looked upon by many of these rural families, especially families belonging to lower castes, as a means to break out of their position in caste hierarchy.

The religious beliefs and practices of a community can also largely impact the overall attitudinal and behavioural profile of an individual or group. In the Indian context, reli­gion has a sway over people’s minds and exerts a great influence over their behaviour. The motivation and attitudes of the people towards education are also moulded, to a large extent, by their religious beliefs. The literacy rate for Muslims is notably lower com­pared to Hindus but not better than Christians and Sikhs.

Poverty among Muslims, who also happen to be one of the most economically back­ward groups, is the actual reason for their preference for madrasas (Islamic schools), because they are absolutely free and more flexible as compared to formal government schools. This seems to be the only option for poor Muslims, who often cannot afford to pay for the education.

1. Defects of Present System:

According to Amartya Sen, ‘Primary education in India suffers not only from inadequate allocation of resource, but often enough also from terrible management and organiza­tion. To him, management and organization of schools is still in a terrible State in India.

That means, there are three major defects in the present educational sys­tem. The first is the physical environment in which the student is taught, the second is the curriculum or the content, which he/she is taught, and the third is the teaching method or the teacher, who is teaching.

2. Physical Environment:

Today’s society clings to schools to such an extent that a co-dependent relationship is created between the broader and friendly notion of education and the manipulative real­ity of school. Education should not be limited to the sphere of the school.

It should have to encompass nearly every aspect of life. Schools should act as locations where the ideas of education are planted in the students and education has to become the foundation for how the students look at the world around them and how they interpret these things. Instead the present situation is that, the seeds of education are planted into the children in the schools but it does not go much further than the school system.

The public in general and rural people in particular, often think of schools as a place for teachers to instruct children on the ‘three Rs’—reading, writing and arithmetic. Schools are not con­sidered as places, where the students are taught many life skills that will help them suc­ceed in their future endeavors.

Access to school is no more a problem in most parts of India. Ninety eight percent of population has access to school within a walking distance of 1 km. The core problem is the unpreparedness of the school system for mass education. Classrooms in most pri­mary schools in rural areas are typically uninviting, with leaking roofs, uneven floors and scraggly mats to sit on.

Added to that, most of the schools do not have electricity, drinking water or toilets. In some schools, students of different ages are made to sit in one room. These students squat in passive postures, even regimented columns, with often the ‘brightest’ and the socially advantaged sitting in front. At a given time, a typical school could have at most two teachers trying to ‘police’ children of all five primary classes.

The best teaching that these teachers may undertake is to make the students copy or recite from the textbook. Sounds emanating from the school are normally distin­guishable from afar in the form of a ritual cacophonous chorus of children chanting their lesson, often shouting their guts out in a cathartic release.

Surprisingly, no normal sounds— of joyous laughter, creative play of words, singing or recitation of poems, ani­mated participation, excited discovery, or even the irrepressible curious questioning the characteristic of every child of that age are found in schools.

The major drawback in these schools is that in the mechanical race to achieve ‘schooling for all’ the government seems to have completely missed out on what constitutes ‘learning for all’. Here, greater emphasis is placed on establishing schools but not on what goes on inside a school.

The result is high enrolment figure and equally high dropout rate. The students enrolled are compelled to attend school regularly and take all the exams, and the result is a sizeable number of students fail and are compelled to repeat classes. These students ultimately give-up the hope, resulting in high resource wastage of the government, while at the same time inculcating a sense of despair among the students, thus, reducing the poten­tial of their human development.

The quality of education is the main issue. For a long time, the educationists had thought that the high dropout rate is because of parental poverty and disinterestedness rather than concentrating on the failure of the school system.

A paper by Jandhyala B. G. Tilak, titled ‘Determinants of Household Expenditure on Education in Rural India, which is based on the results of NCAER’s 1994 Human Development in India (HDI) survey, tries to clarify some of such myths that are associated with the education in rural India. The study mentions that the real household expenditures on education in India is not ‘virtually non-existent’, but is considerably higher.

Some of the observations made by this study are as follows:

1. First, there is a complete absence of ‘free education’ in India, regardless of a household’s socio-economic background, spending on education is very sub­stantial even at the primary school level.

2. Second, ‘indirect’ costs, such as books, uniforms and examination fees, are very high, even in government-run schools, including at the primary level. According to National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO), in 1995-96, the average expenditure per student pursuing primary education in rural India in a govern­ment school was Rs.219, and for students going to local body schools, private-aided schools and private-unaided schools, it was Rs 223, Rs 622 and Rs 911, respectively.

3. Third, given the absence of a well-developed credit market for education, expenditure on education is highly (and positively) correlated with income.

4. Fourth, willingness to pay and ‘compulsion to pay’ (i.e., the need to compensate for a shortage of government spending on education) are two important factors.

5. Fifth, government spending and household spending on education are not sub­stitutes but complementary. An increase in government spending is associated with an increase in household spending (due to an enthusiasm effect, resulting from improvements in school facilities, number of teachers, etc.).

Conversely, a reduction in government expenditure leads to a decline in household spending on education. (Equivalently, the elasticity of household expenditure to govern­ment expenditure is found to be almost unitary, and positive.)

6. Finally, the provision of schooling in rural habitations, or the provision of such school incentives as mid-day meals, uniforms, textbooks, etc., are both associ­ated with the increased household demand for education.

3. Defects in Curriculum:

The second reason attributed to high dropout rate is ‘most out-of school children are unable to study because they have to work’. The recent study by PROBE has refuted this reason as myth. It says that only a small minority of children are full-time wage labour­ers, while the majority of those, who work do so as family labourers at home or in the fields. According to this study, it is not because the children have to work that they leave school, but because they leave school they work. Then why do children leave schools?

The present education system is teacher-centric. From times immemorial, education has been expensive, as it is related to gaining and transmitting knowledge in India. ‘Information,’ the foundation upon which knowledge rests was and still is in limited supply.

A teacher, together with a united set of books, is the knowledge base, which anchors the education process. The teacher is the active agent, communicating information to the students, who are the passive receptors of information. Learning by rote is the method most favoured because the information transmitted is largely disjointed and the student is not really quite sure what the motivation behind knowing all those disparate facts is.

Curriculum-makers in India feel that children need to know a lot more to catch-up’ with the others living in advanced countries. So, they try to include as much ‘informa­tion and ‘knowledge’ as possible in the curriculum. While it is true that this century has seen an explosion of technologies that help to store large information, the capacity to understand these facts and concepts does not grow equally fast among the children.

Therefore, a crucial aim of children’s education should be to promote concept formation and enhance their capacity for theory-building. All children are natural theory builders, and from very early in life, they begin to construct their own explanations for the world they observe. The educational system presents a contrasting experience to these chil­dren.

These outdated school systems do not allow for a child’s mind and personality to develop. Moreover, the knowledge imparted is not continuous and are disjointed frag­ments of information that are arranged in the form of different pieces in the syllabus.

The curriculum-framers, while arranging such information, ignore the fact that the natural learning process in children is far from linear, and that they process information about the world in a much more holistic and integrated manner. The content taught, therefore, cannot be determined by what has to be ‘covered’ in higher classes, but by the children’s ability to comprehend the concept at a given age.

In the Indian system of education, what is taught is crucially linked with how it is taught and, more importantly, with how it is assessed. The examination system here is so distorted that it actually discourages good classroom practices by forcing children to answer contrived meaningless questions, suppressing their own curiosity and expres­sion. It emphasizes on written questions based on trivial recall, and discounts all activity- based learning.

Another major drawback is that the curriculum prescribed in the textbooks to a great extent are found to be ‘irrelevant’ to the closer lives of rural people. The curriculum-makers, who come predominantly from urban middle-class background believe that the rural children need to be taught how to conduct their lives ‘properly’, and that only ‘positive’ situations from their lives must be depicted.

Thus, either highly pre­scriptive and moralistic lessons (about hygiene, cleanliness, hard work, etc.) or rather simplistic generalizations about the perceived ‘needs’ of the rural poor or over-idealized situations such as truly democratic panchayats, benevolent employers, well-equipped and functioning village hospitals, effective government schemes, etc., are described in the prescribed textbooks. They absolutely ignore the fact that the rural children, unlike those from protected urban homes, are much more conscious of the conflicts and com­plexities of life, which form a part of their reality.

They know very well that these lessons are contrived and untrue, but have no chance to critically question the contents that they must passively parrot. The village child is also far more knowledgeable about the natural world, and does not need to look at ‘pictures’ to count the legs of a spider, or to identify the eggs of a frog or the leaves of a neem tree.

Similarly, the teachers and other school authorities also neglect the fact that many rural children, especially the tribal children, are aware of rich bio-diversity around them. They become conscious only when some foreign companies pirate this information and patent it. Thus, in the name of relevance, most of the content taught in the schools is totally irrelevant to the prevailing situations of the rural children.

In recent years, there have been attempts to change the elementary school curricu­lum to make it more child-centred, joyful and activity-based. However, in most cases, there have been mere cosmetic changes accompanied by much ‘song and dance’, with no radical restructuring in the content and design. The education systems in this region are highly monopolistic and rigid, and are controlled by bureaucratic departments that are resistant to change.

Moreover, the people, who design school curricula have outdated notions about what constitutes ‘learning’, are burdened with the perceived demands of higher education, and are far removed from a typical average child of the country. They are also far too inflexible to learn from the experience of village teachers and field-based voluntary groups working in close contact with children. Some flexibility may be per­mitted in the curriculum for ‘those children’ in non-formal schools, but never in the highly guarded formal system for ‘our kids’.

4. Most Important Resource—The Teacher:

The protagonist of the educational system and the most important resource for quality education, the teacher, in reality has the feeblest voice in the matters of concern. The rural primary school teacher occupies the lowest position in the hierarchy. Apart from teaching, he/she is expected to bear the burden of many other assignments such as col­lecting census, propagating family planning programmes, conducting poverty surveys, etc.

The teacher in a village acts as the sole multi-purpose village functionary, and is expected to perform whatever function the government finds necessary at any time. This problem becomes most acute in the case of village schools, having a single or at most two teachers. For days together, the school may remain closed because the teacher has been summoned on ‘duty’, further discouraging children, who in the absence of support at home, need much more attention and extra time.

Another major problem that has come up in recent days is that, due to the ceiling on recruitments, there is insufficient number of teachers in many of these schools. A con­siderable proportion of available teachers do not have the requisite qualifications. Women teachers constitute only 31 percent of the total number of teachers in rural areas, which is supposed to be one of the causes for low literacy rate.

Lack of motivation on the part of teachers, who generally are academically low- qualified and have chosen this profession as a last resort, is a serious problem. Added to this, the teachers are burdened with unmanageable classes, irrelevant curricula, dismal working conditions, and lack of recognition of their efforts. Moreover, these teachers are lowly paid. The result is that the teachers tend to give up.

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