How NEP 2020 follows the philosophy laid down by Aurobindo
Date : 18/05/2024
The Union Cabinet of India, a couple of months ago, gave the nod to National Education Policy 2020. It is a one-of-a-kind policy which is a result of one of the largest consultation exercises in India, right from the roots of the gram panchayat. It is the first education policy of the 21st century to address growing developmental imperatives of India. If we look at the history of post-Independent India, the Centre has laid out many national education policy reforms. The Secondary Education Commission (1952) came up with the three-language formula and the Kothari Commission (1964) emphasised promoting national consciousness as an objective of the school system. The National Education Policy (1968) put forward a new education structure (10+2+3) and this became the universally accepted fundamental system for secondary school education in India.
Table 1 below lists out various education policies proposed since Independence. The latest addition is NEP 2020, featuring restructures in the education system, holistic development of the child and new perspectives in assessment.
Table 1: Educational Policies since Independence
If we look at the above table, it is noticeably clear that the frameworks and educational policy of India have been focusing on universalisation of national education with respect to access and equality.
The National Education Policy (2020) lays down a set of key principles which were conceptualised at the start of the National Education Movement in the Bengal Provincial Conference. This movement emphasised striving for national education with an Indian ethos under the leadership of Sri Aurobindo, Rabindranath Tagore and many others. This conference was of the opinion to take steps towards promoting a system of education literary, technical, and scientific suited to the requirements of the country on national lines and under national control and maintaining national schools throughout the country.
What is National Education? Who can be called the lead inspiration for the National Education movement?
Concept of National Education
The meaning of the term ‘National Education’ is not clear to many. National Education, with its specific connotation, is suspect and sometimes even men of wisdom dismiss it. In Bengal on the other hand, the need to explain the concept does not even arise, mentions Sri Aurobindo. There may be people in favour of it or against it, but National Education is taken by them as a given fact, as something they have already experienced. National Education must be on national lines and under national control. Sri Aurobindo highlights: “When we look at the history of the country, we find that at one time we had a system of National Education. Look at our philosophy: what is in the individual is also in the universal. A nation is a living entity, full of consciousness; it is not something made up or fabricated. A living nation is always growing; it must grow, it must attain ever loftier heights. This may happen after a thousand years or in the next twenty years but happen it must.” (Aurobindo, S., 1952).
Sri Aurobindo’s (1956) concept of ‘education’ is not limited to acquiring information, “But the acquiring of various kinds of information’’, he points out, “is only one and not the chief of the means and necessities of education: its central aim is the building of the powers of the human mind and spirit, it is the formation or, as I would prefer to view it, the evoking of knowledge, character, culture—that at least if no more. And this distinction makes an enormous difference.”
Objective of National Education
A student must be able to stand on his own. It is not the objective of National Education to make somebody else carry the student on their shoulders. The student must support himself and not look helplessly to others. Self-reliance is the basic principle we diligently try to impart to a student. In school education, mother tongue is the medium of instruction up to fifth standard; teaching children through English is harmful according to Sri Aurobindo. According to him, seventh standard in national schools was equivalent to the intermediate courses conducted by the universities then. In national colleges, a four-year course was conducted. A college student usually studies a single subject and for that purpose special emphasis is given to the use of English. Despite that, English is not given primary importance in the syllabus of our system of National Education; it has the status of a second language. In the national schools of Bengal, the students learn about science in depth and not just superficially. And they are taught many vocational subjects, such as carpentry and smithy, along with science (Aurobindo, S., 1995).
Sri Aurobindo called for the need to learn and use the democratic principle and methods from Europe, to build up something more suited to our past and to the future of humanity. Aurobidno states in Karmayogin: “We have to throw away the individualism and materialism and keep the democracy. We must solve for the human race, the problem of harmonising and spiritualising its impulses towards liberty, equality and fraternity. In order that we may fulfil our mission we must be masters in our own home. A nation need not be luxuriously wealthy in order to be profoundly artistic, but it must have a certain amount of well-being, a national culture and, above all, hope and ardour, if it is to maintain a national art based on a widespread development of artistic perception and faculty.” Sri Aurobindo emphasised the role of aesthetic arts, craft and industry in moral and spiritual uplifting of humanity as part of India’s National Education Mission (Aurobindo, S.,1950). In the next piece, we will see how NEP 2020 fulfills this framework and what more may be required.
Picture Credits: https://www.sriaurobindoashram.org/sriaurobindo/
Dr. Sindhuja C V is Post Doctoral Research Associate and Prof Ashok H S is Visiting Professor, Center for Education and Social Studies.
References
Aurobindo, S. (1995). Bande mataram (p. 132). Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
Aurobindo, S. (1950). The ideal of the karmayogin (Volume 2). Sri Aurobindo Ashram.
Gupta, A. (2008). Tracing global-local transitions within early childhood curriculum and practice in India. Research in Comparative and International Education, 3(3), 266-280.
Pani, R. (1987). Integral education: Thought and practice. Ashish Publishing House.
National Policy of Education (1986). New Delhi: MHRD, Government of India
National Policy of Education (2020). New Delhi: MHRD, Government of India
National Programme of Mid-Day Meal in Schools. (2018). New Delhi: MHRD, Government of India.
Secondary Education Commission. (1952-53). Report of Secondary Education Commission. New Delhi: Ministry of Education and Youth Services.
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