RURAL EDUCATION IN INDIA

1. S. Rinaldi Amalraj
Asst. Prof, Dept of English,
Mahendra Arts and Science College,
Kalippatti, Namakkal.

Introduction:

Education plays a vital role in our daily life it also gives meaning to our life. Proper
education is a best source for man than any resources. So everyone in this world is eager to
get education for them and also for their upcoming generations.

Education in India:

India viewed education as an effective tool for bringing social change and community
development. So it gives more importance to education than any other department. Majority
of people living in villages have understood the importance of education and know that it is
the only way to get rid of poverty. When we talk about education in India, we can’t just talk
about how education is in urban cities of India, without going deep into rural education that
constitutes almost 90% of the schools being located in rural areas. Education in rural India is
valued differently from in an urban setting, with lower rates of completion.

Rural Education:

This term rural education means giving education to all people who are all from rural,
urban, tribal areas. Majority of people in India still lives in villages and so the topic of rural
education in India is of utmost importance. Recent studies have shown how the face of
education in rural parts of the country have developed to a great extent, but some remote
areas still do need a serious check-up with children failing to receive basic quality education.
We can agree that, it is education that leads to the road to betterment of a community and the
nation at large. And when we think about bring in a reformation in education, we have to
point out what all prevents the education system in India to develop. Let’s start it with rural
education.

The past set of rural education in India:

The administrative control was effectively initiated in the 1950s, when, in 1952, the
government grouped villages under a Community Development Block—an authority under
national programme which could control education in up to 100 villages. A Block
Development Officer oversaw a geographical area of 150 square miles (390 km2) which
could contain a population of as many as 70000 people. The rural education programmes
continued throughout the 1950s, with support from private institutions. A sizable network of
rural education had been established by the time the Gandhi Gram Rural Institute was
established and 5, 200 Community Development Blocks were established in India. Nursery
schools, elementary schools, secondary school, and schools for adult education for women
were set up. The government continued to view rural education as an agenda that could be
relatively free from bureaucratic backlog and general stagnation. In some cases lack of
financing balanced the gains made by rural education institutes of India. Some ideas failed to
find acceptability among India's poor and investments made by the government sometimes
yielded little results. Today, government rural schools remain poorly funded and
understaffed. Several foundations, such as the Rural Development Foundation (Hyderabad),
actively build high-quality rural schools, but the number of students served is small.

The real setting of rural education in India; Problem, reason and remedy:

A survey named called the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER), shows that
even though the number of rural students attending schools is rising, but more than half of the
students in fifth grade are unable to read a second grade text book and are not able to solve
simple mathematical problems. Not only this, the level of maths and reading is further
declining. Though efforts are being made, they are not in the right direction. The reason for
this problem in surveys is the increasing number of single classroom to educate students from
more than one grade. In some states attendance of teachers and students is also declining.
Quality and access to education is the major concern in rural schools as there are fewer
committed teachers, lack of proper text books and learning material in the schools. If the
quality along with number of teachers and, that too committed teacher can be improved in
these schools, then aspiring rural children and India can fulfil their dreams of doing
something great. Due to lack of teachers, in some of the government schools there is only one
teacher for the entire school and if they don’t show up at work, then it is a holiday. Some
government schools in rural India are overly packed with students, leading to a distorted
teacher- student ratio. In one such remote village in Arunachal Pradesh there are more than
300 students in class X which makes nearly 100 students in each classroom. In such a
situation it is impossible for teachers to pay full attention towards each and every student,
even if they are willing to help. Every village is not provided with school which means that
students have to go to another village to get education. Owing to this parents usually do not
send their daughters to school, leading to a failure in achieving rural education in India.
Poverty is another setback. Government schools are not as good and private schools are
expensive. This results in a very low number of students actually clearing their secondary
education and taking admission in colleges for further studies. So the drop-out-rate at the
secondary level is extremely high in villages. Only parents who can afford college education
send their kids to secondary schools. If parents are not able to send their wards for higher
education then all their previous efforts get wasted as completing just secondary education
means a low paying job and the person is again struck in the same never ending cycle of
money, life and poverty. Though some of the students from villages are really brilliant, as
they have a wealth of practical knowledge and know how to survive even in very harsh
conditions of life, difficultly in understanding their textbooks, lack of facilities and their
poverty are a hurdle in their education.

Quality related issues are far powerful than poverty. Students are not at all encouraged
to think but they are asked to memorize pre-defined questions for exams. So for many
students clearing examination at the end of the session, passing their exam becomes more
important than gaining knowledge. Also as per the new CBSE rule, every student is supposed
to be promoted to the next class irrespective of marks in their examination. Hence majority of
students do not bother to study, which means a decline in their education level . Neither
students nor teachers take any interest in studies which is why the level of education is
declining in India despite many efforts. The foundation to turn India into a strong nation has
to be laid down at primary and rural levels and so the quality of education right from the
beginning should be excellent. Education and text books should be made interesting. For
rural students textbooks related to their culture, their traditions and values should also be
there so as to create their interest in studies. The reasons behind so many drop-outs in spite of
free education should be found out as this is a hurdle on the road to progress. Improvement in
the condition of government schools, education quality, committed teachers and more salaries
to these teachers should be part of development. There is a difference between city and
village student not in terms of brain or development but their initial environment, skills,
learning ability, availability of infrastructure, and access to different facilities.

The current trend in rural education; Difference between city and village:
 It is not that the children of our cities and the children of our villages should be taught
different things. The curricula must obviously be of the same standard. But it would be wise
to recognize that the different contexts have fostered different inherent skills and abilities.
Their initial upbringing would have also emphasized different skills, so they start from a
different qualitative baseline. Not only are the students, but also the education environment
varied. Many rural schools have less robust buildings, problems in access with seasonal
variations, and less access to a range of knowledge centres even if they have great
teachers. Many of the current problems in our rural schools are well known. Most have
inadequate infrastructure – solid walls and a roof that does not leak are considered an
achievement. Most do not have toilets or reliable electricity. Teaching equipment is limited to
a rudimentary blackboard and chalk, and textbooks do not always reach the students on
time. The greatest challenge for rural schools is to find ways to encourage children who are
genuinely able and interested in the pursuit of academics. Such children have to depend on
the single (or a small number) teacher and hope that they are both competent and kind enough
to invest time in nurturing them. At this stage it often becomes about personalities,
relationships, power structures in the village and about possible exchange of value rather than
the school being a system where such students get their answers. Rural infrastructure suffers
the effects of isolation too. There have been some notable successes in recent years in rural
education. The Barefoot College, where literacy is not a requirement for being trained as a
professional in rural electrification is well known. Other examples such as the 8 Day
Academy, where education is delivered in a capsule version – 8 days of targeted workshops
that give them new skills and knowledge. Subjects include computers, public speaking and
idea development. Another shining example is the Gurukul School in rural Bihar that is run
via power generators and Skype, where fee paying students log attendance via the computer
and teachers via bio metric fingerprint machine. Lessons are delivered by trained teachers
who were selected from all over the state via an entrance exam and by other engineers via
Skype. Each of these is an innovative solution to bypass or supplement the issues in rural
education. Each of these efforts is driven by individuals. There are many such inspiring
efforts across the country that seeks to provide quality education.

The challenges faced in rural education:

The most common problems that hinders the growth of education in rural India can be
pointed out as
 Lack of proper transportation. Most villages have poor connectivity from one place to
another and that is often one of the main reasons why, despite efforts by local governing
bodies to build schools, often go in vain. Children, most of the time has to walk miles to
reach these government funded schools and this often demotivates them to attend school
on a regular basis.
 People belonging to remote rural areas have meagre incomes, which at times is too less to
sustain a family of maybe four or five. Most likely, children from these families won’t be
sent to schools, instead would be asked to assist the earning member of the family to add
up some extra income. On the other hand, teachers in rural educational centres in villages
are paid poorly, often leading to lack of attention by teachers, ultimately forcing the
students to suffer.
 In the case of textbooks are only available in English and since people in rural areas either
speaks their native language or Hindi, but not English that defeats the purpose. This
results in lack of their interest in studies.
 Lack of proper infrastructure at these rural schools is also a big concern. Most of the
schools don’t have proper classrooms, teaching equipment, playgrounds and even basic
facilities like clean toilets. Thus, the poor condition of schools is big reasons to drive
away students.
These are some of the few prominent crises that are holding back rural education to match up
with the education system in urban educational centres. Education imparted in rural centres
lack in quality and it’s high time, proper attention is paid to these centres and create a
platform where students from rural areas can get proper education, the right encouragement
to pursue further studies and jobs. Proper availability of basic facilities like clean toilets,
drinking water, adequate classroom facilities and timely motivational programs for teachers
etc. The right reformation can definitely bring about a positive change towards the
development of rural education in India.

Growing prevalence of private schools and tuition centre’s:

Even as the Right to Education and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan have made access to
elementary education a reality for 99 per cent villages across the country, more than a quarter
of enrolments in rural India are in private schools. As per the ninth Annual Status of
Education Report (ASER), released here on Wednesday, 29 per cent of enrolments in the six-
to-14 age-group are in private schools. This is a 10 per cent increase in seven years from 18.7
per cent in 2006 to 29 per cent in 2013.While this reflects a shifting of public faith in
government schools, the growing preference for private schools is also indicative of a
willingness to invest in a child’s education by parents who very often are themselves
illiterate. The preference for private schools is not necessarily reflective of the quality of
public schooling. In Kerala, where the quality of public schools and teaching was found to be
fairly good, 68.6 per cent of all children in the elementary level were in private schools.
Manipur recorded the highest private school enrolment at 70 percent. Other States and Union
Territories with a high percentage of elementary school children in private institutions
include Pondicherry (54.3 percent), Haryana (51.4 per cent), Uttar Pradesh (49 per cent),
Punjab (46.7 per cent), Jammu & Kashmir (45.5 per cent) and Meghalaya (45.3 per cent). As
with private schooling, there is also a growing prevalence of private tuitions among
elementary school students. The figure stands at 24.1 per cent.

Conclusion:

All of these must be considered while making the curricula which should not be
different but how it is going to be taught would make the difference. Encourage the genuine
rural students who are interested in education and make them competent. There are many
examples of success in rural education in India like the Barefoot College, 8 Day Academy
and Gurukul School in Bihar. These are innovative and successful examples of schools
running in rural India. It is the time to replicate such efforts as our country and its rural
population is very vast which means one of two stories of these kinds won’t make any
difference. Instead of this large number of such schools are required in rural India. It is also
absolutely mandatory to evaluate the success of the schools and students at each and every
level. Timely assessment will throw light on present problems and achievements. Let us try to
build a solution around these problems which will resolve the overall issues of rural
education in India.