Contextualising Educational Studies in India: Research, Policy and Practices 9780367519698, 9780367765378, 9781003098997

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‘Educational research in India focuses, very often, on improving pedagogical practices. This volume attempts to link educational processes and progress with broader issues of economic and social development from comparative and interdisciplinary perspectives. The discussions on equity and inclusion, gender, marginalisation and employability contextualise the issues to be prioritised for education policy and research in India. It brings together young researchers and their critical analyses and understanding, and the volume makes a good contribution to deepen our understanding of the discourses on educational research in India.’ N.V. Varghese, Vice Chancellor, National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, New Delhi, India ‘When young researchers come together, look at the landscape of education in India with heightened critical consciousness and empirical details, and raise sociologically relevant questions, I see a possibility, or a language of hope. Yes, this edited volume expands our horizon, and makes us see the prevalent practice of education  while being deeply aware of the dynamics of caste and patriarchy, or urban marginalities and regional variations. A book of this kind is bound to activate the socio-political and pedagogic imagination of educationists, teachers and researchers.’ Avijit Pathak, Professor of Sociology, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India

Contextualising Educational Studies in India

This volume presents an interdisciplinary framework to map out contemporary educational studies in India. Based on conceptual tools, quantitative methods and ethnographic accounts drawn from extensive fieldwork, it addresses emerging discourses on educational policies, their operation in the everyday functioning of institutions and actual practices in teaching and learning. Individual chapters discuss the intersectionality in the current educational system of region, gender, class, caste and minorities. With comparative perspectives and case studies from across states, including under-studied rural and urban regions of India, the book explores a wide range of issues affecting the educational system, including socioeconomic and gender inequalities; the educational status of tribal settlements in the hinterlands and their respective urban areas; the marginalisation of minorities; challenges in accessing educational avenues and choices; and the model for imparting vocational education and training. It navigates complex sites of discrimination and exclusion in the institutional spaces of the educational system and assesses the consequences of market dynamics and ideological undercurrents. Presenting first-hand information from the field, it evaluates educational policies, practices and research; investigates challenges and failures; provides suggestions and fosters critical thinking for a knowledge society. The findings in this book will be of interest to researchers, scholars and teachers of education, economics, sociology, urban education and the politics of education, as well as of public policy, governance and development studies. It will also be useful to research institutions, policymakers, educationists, social scientists, education professionals, and governmental and non-governmental bodies working on education. Pradeep Kumar Choudhury teaches at the Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India. Previously, he worked at the Institute for Studies in Industrial Development and Public Health Foundation of India. His research covers applied development economics, especially issues related to education, health and labour. Currently, he is collaborating with Delhi Research Implementation and Innovation (DRIIV) cluster (‘Effective Education’ vertical), coordinated by IIT Delhi, and sponsored by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India. He recently completed an international collaborative

study with the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Stanford University, USA, that assesses and improves student learning in engineering and higher education in a comparative international perspective. Suresh Babu G.S teaches at the Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, India. Before this, he was on faculty at the University of Jammu. His research focuses on the postcolonial debates of subaltern communities in India and investigates the role of education in shaping the cultural politics. He edited Education and the Public Sphere: Exploring the Structures of Mediation in Post-Colonial India (Routledge 2019).

Contextualising Educational Studies in India Research, Policy and Practices Edited by Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G.S

First published 2021 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business © 2021 selection and editorial matter, Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G.S; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G.S to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-0-367-51969-8 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-367-76537-8 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-003-09899-7 (ebk) Typeset in Sabon by SPi Global, India

Contents

List of figures List of tables Foreword Acknowledgments List of contributors Introduction: Mapping the field of education policy research

ix x xi xiii xv 1

PRADEEP KUMAR CHOUDHURY AND SURESH BABU G.S

PART I

Equity, access and inclusion in school education

27

1 Problems of equity and access in education: A case of school-merging policy

29

AYSHA MALIK

2 Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion: The case of a tribal community

49

LIPIKA DAS

PART II

Women and minorities in higher education

71

3 Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system? A case study of a women’s university in Rajasthan

73

RAVI SHANKAR AND REENU RAM

4 The inclusion of minorities in the changing dynamics of education CHINGIZ KHAN

91

viii  Contents PART III

Youth, urban marginality and education: A contested terrain

111

5 Education, youth and labour market: A case of urban marginalities

113

NAOMI PRACHI HAZARIKA

6 Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries

131

HEENA KHARI

7 Contesting learning spaces in higher education: Problems of language acquisition

148

ANUP KUMAR BALI

PART IV

Knowledge and labour market: Redefining skills and aspirations

167

8 Higher education and knowledge-based industries: Understanding geographical preferences

169

SUMIT KUMAR

9 Students’ aspirations for social sciences: Explorations from a field survey

187

AAKRITI SAINI

10 Imparting vocational education and training through higher education institutions: An integrative model

205

ANTARA SENGUPTA AND LEENA CHANDRAN WADIA

Index

225

Figures

1.1 Block-wise merging of schools in Jaipur District (2013–2014 to 2015–2016) 1.2 District-wise merger of schools in Rajasthan (2013–2016) 4.1 Enrolment of Muslim and other minority communities in higher education in Manipur (2012–2018) 6.1 Trends in the educational achievement of the total population of Gujjars in Mandawali 6.2 Trends in the educational achievement of the male population of Gujjars in Mandawali 6.3 Trends in the educational achievement of the female population of Gujjars in Mandawali 6.4 Income sources of Mandawali villagers 7.1 Distribution of students with school fee per month 8.1 Lorenz Curve representing the inequality in the distributions of KBIs, HEIs and THEIs 9.1 Aspirations of students after graduation 9.2 Preferred work area based on gender 10.1 Verticals (industry sectors) in which courses are being offered at the School of Vocational Education of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS-SVE) as of 2019 10.2 Growth of enrolment in B.Voc courses at the TISS-SVE 10.3 The work-integrated training model developed by the TISS-SVE, showing the respective roles and responsibilities of each of its three sets of partners

36 37 97 139 140 140 143 153 174 195 196

213 213

216

Tables

1.1 Schools temporarily closed in India 1.2 Schools merged in Rajasthan, 2014 and 2016 1.3 Status of schools in Rajasthan before the merger policy: 2013–2014 to 2015–2016 1.4 Status of schools in Rajasthan after the merger policy: 2013–2014 to 2015–2016 1.5 Profile of Adarsh Vidyalaya and merged schools in two blocks of Jaipur 1.6 School profile before the mergers: 2013–2014 1.7 Percentage of students facing difficulties after the merger policy 4.1 Representation of Muslim and other religious communities in school in Colonial Manipur 4.2 Percentage share of enrolment with respect to population 4.3 District-wise literacy rate of Muslims (male and female) in Manipur (2011) 4.4 Reservation for OBCs in appointments to government posts/services and admission to professional institutes 4.5 Enrolment of minority communities in higher education (2012–2018) 4.6 Muslim and Meitei OBC students in the affiliated colleges in Manipur University (2017–2018) 6.1 Student enrolment by type of school in Mandawali 7.1 Sample distribution by category and gender 7.2 Variation of school fee and factors for difficulty in learning 8.1 Degree of geographical distribution of HEIs, THEIs and KBIs 8.2 Representation of colleges in various buffer zones encircling KBI clusters 9.1 Decision to pursue master’s degree in social sciences: Logit estimates 9.2 Notation and definition of variables used in logit regressions

34 35 39 39 40 41 43 94 97 99 100 109 110 142 153 154 175 178 196 203

Foreword

It was more than five decades ago that the Education Commission wrote that India’s destiny was being shaped in its classrooms and expressed high optimism, casting education as the central instrument for national development. Indian education has undoubtedly made great strides since then. We have achieved near universal enrolment of children; the number of schools and colleges has multiplied; the demand for higher education has witnessed an unprecedented increase. India has emerged as a global centre for cyber technology, acquitted itself as a lead country in space technology and so on. Yet, paradoxically, the National Education Policy 2020 describes the educational situation in the country in grave terms, as facing a ‘Learning Crisis,’ where a large majority of youngsters do not possess mastery even of the basic skills of reading, writing and arithmetic. That this is so despite school attendance for several years and completing the full cycle of compulsory education for eight years is especially puzzling. Of course, a small band of elites continue to shine, making remarkable progress in self-development as well as contributing to the country’s progress in the midst of this crisis. After more than seven decades of independence, Indian education seems to have landed itself in a strange and complex state of what Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen aptly describe in their book, An Uncertain Glory, as ‘privileged excellence and social divisions.’ But as we know, this is not a new finding. For several years, field surveys and research explorations have highlighted this problem of poor levels of learning in schools and stark divisions in educational progress based on class, caste and community. The researchers have done well in correctly diagnosing the problem. But what use is research that does not help to rectify the malady and improve the education system in India? This is the common refrain of many observers of educational research conducted in the country. It is, of course, unwise to value research solely in instrumental terms, assessing its immediate usefulness to current practice, and deride studies that appear theoretical in nature. However, in the prevailing situation, when the country is still struggling to provide even primary education of acceptable quality to all children, it is quite legitimate to expect that investment in research would add value to efforts to improve the system. For this to happen, research studies in education have to be designed so as to capture changes and improvements in the

xii  Foreword field reality, in general, and to be able to link such changes to contemporary policies and development actions in the education system, in particular. Such studies have to go deeper and engage with structural issues of marginalisation and discrimination. Explorations have to be carried out from a multidimensional and multidisciplinary perspective, as the problem often may not be located in the education sector but rather in the social and economic dynamics characterising the context in which educational processes are taking place. I am quite pleased to find that the research studies included in the present volume attempt to embody such a perspective in their empirical exploration, as well as in their methodological underpinnings. This is a unique collection of work by young scholars who bring fresh thinking in analysing and understanding the problems confronting Indian education. I have no doubt that this will be a valuable addition to the knowledge base on education in India. R. Govinda ICSSR National Fellow and Distinguished Professor, Council for Social Development, New Delhi; Former vice chancellor, the National University of Educational Planning and Administration, New Delhi, India

Acknowledgments

Contemporary educational discourses of India, which is a young democracy and the largest in the world, have by and large aligned on policy perspectives. As a nation-building programme, education not only signifies the developmental trajectory but is also an instrument in shaping the social and cultural transformation of diverse communities in India. Of late, research studies in education have evolved as a specialised field and advanced as an interdisciplinary domain for theoretical exploration and empirical investigation, as well as policy transformation. Through this volume, we introduce a set of in-depth analyses of the problems of education as a field of research, by critically probing the policy discourses, practices and consequences. The book describes the educational environment and its diverse political considerations, especially the intellectual voices of young researchers, the concerns they raise and the contributions they offer in studies of education. The chapters are drawn from field-based research papers presented in the young scholars’ seminar held at the Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies (ZHCES), Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), under the aegis of the Centre of Advanced Studies (CAS), aided by the University Grants Commission. At the outset, we thank all the contributors to this volume for their dedication and academic commitment. Prof. R. Govinda, former vice chancellor, the National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, kindly accepted our invitation to deliver the inaugural lecture at the seminar and subsequently agreed to write the foreword for this volume, which we appreciate. We also appreciate the more than three dozen young scholars, selected from universities across India, who presented their research papers at the seminar. We are indebted to our colleagues, especially Prof. Saumen Chattopadhyay, CAS coordinator; Prof. Srinivasa Rao, the centre’s chairperson, and the office staff for extending all logistical support for organising the event. We appreciate our scholars at the centre for their active participation throughout the event. Without their active support, we could not have successfully organised the seminar. Many thanks to the Routledge publishing team for readily accepting our book proposal, especially Lubna Irfan and Rimina Mahapatra, who provided editorial assistance from its inception to the final stage. We are grateful to the anonymous referees for their encouragement, creative suggestions

xiv  Acknowledgments and critical comments on the overall framework and special observations on every chapter of this volume, which positively contributed to the authors’ work in shaping it into the present form. Much of our work on this volume was undertaken during the Covid-19 pandemic. Despite all adverse circumstances, our respective family members were extremely helpful in facilitating our work with emotional support and care, as they do always. Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G.S Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India

Contributors

Anup Kumar Bali is Research Scholar, the School of Culture and Creative Expression, Ambedkar University Delhi, India. Lipika Das is Research Scholar, the Zakir Hussain Centre for Educational Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. Naomi Prachi Hazarika is Research Scholar, the National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, New Delhi, India. Chingiz Khan is Research Scholar, the Centre for Historical Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. Heena Khari is Research Scholar, the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India. Sumit Kumar is Research Scholar, the National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, New Delhi, India. Aysha Malik is Research Scholar, the National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, New Delhi, India. Reenu Ram is Research Scholar, the Centre for the Study of Social Systems, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. Aakriti Saini is Research Scholar, the Zakir Hussain Centre for Educational Studies, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. Antara Sengupta is an Erasmus+ scholar pursuing the Erasmus Mundus Master in Education Policies for Global Development (GLOBED), jointly hosted by the University of Glasgow, the Autonomous University of Barcelona, University of Bremen and the University of Cyprus. Ravi Shankar teaches history at Hindu College, University of Delhi, India. Leena Chandran Wadia is Senior Research Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation, Mumbai, India.

Introduction Mapping the field of education policy research Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S.

Of the many strategies adopted to improve the conditions of education, scientific research figures as a prominent methodological and theoretical approach. A research-based approach in this field focuses broadly on ways and means to promote quality, build a knowledge base and enhance professional development of research (Towne et al., 2005). As discussed in detail later in this introduction, recent reports and studies indicate many changes in the state of education in India and, at the same time, some striking continuities which suggest a lack of changes to the nature of the social order. Ascribing external factors is intrinsic to the problems that the educational system suffers today. A similar trend can be observed throughout the spectrum of disciplines dealing with knowledge and epistemology, especially in the domain of policy science. Education policies and practices are defined and redefined in various ways, and critical analysis reveals dispositions of power, ideology and material relations. A particular branch of disciplinary approach runs into a series of difficulties in trying to unpack the complexity involved in education research. In this context, interdisciplinary research becomes imperative. The present volume aims to chart out different ways to organise interdisciplinary research in the field of education. It problematises the education policy discourses, their operation in the everyday functioning of institutions and their impact on teaching and learning processes. Moreover, the empirical details presented in the chapters describe the internal tensions, interlinkages and influences of external forces as they seldom exhibit many facets of inconsistency. Increasing awareness of the instability of the policy science to a large extent registers these inconsistencies causing the risks of uncertainty and the predictability. A scholarly attempt to engage with these inconsistent discourses is the work of the research community. As reflexive agents, researchers can closely observe and describe dangerous propositions of the inconsistencies associated with the education policy and practices to advance an improved understanding of the new possibilities to revise the discourses in light of actual practices and ground realities (Whitty, 2002). Building on this work, the research community then becomes the means both for socially responsible scientific practice and for generating new knowledge. Educational research aimed to invent and adopt

2  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. new methodological tools and their appropriate uses is a challenging task, requiring expertise and the highest professional standards. Since India’s independence, federal and national legislation on educational reforms has repeatedly catapulted educational research into prominence. These reform strategies were premised on the assumption that educational research would contribute in many ways to policy frameworks and actual educational practices. Besides providing detailed conceptual explanations, educational research has entered into an evidence-based field, to illuminate the linkage between the concepts and actual practices. It has also generated a wider appreciation of what constitutes both skepticism about quality in education and rigour with respect to studying education. Many attempts have been made to connect educational objectives with the developmental trajectories of the nation. An expansion of the educational landscape and the political language in education policies have become the new focus and content for empirical investigation. Studies have been undertaken to navigate the questions of access, inclusion, quality, equity and justice in Indian education (Deshpande & Zacharias, 2013; Hasan & Nussbaum, 2012; Govinda, 2011; Kapur & Mehta, 2017; Lall & Nambissan, 2011; Singh, 2016). Furthermore, the multitude of crises resulting from the new social and political arrangements under the global process – the market, the consumer culture and totalitarian politics – have implicated today’s educational system and pedagogical practices. The educational crisis is generating uncertainty in young people’s lives and the nation’s future prospects. Recent studies, in fact, have exposed the emerging crisis in education and the failure of public policies in India (Agarwal, 2012; Apoorvanand, 2018; Devi, 2017; Chattopadhyay, 2009; Patnaik, 2019; Pathak, 2018; Tilak, 2018). Locating and studying education in the complex matrix of society is a task for specialists who are not only trained in this specific area but who have also developed as competing professionals (Thapan, 2015). The exponential growth of educational institutions and the diverse disciplinary and interdisciplinary practices in teaching and learning are causing another set of problems of social justice within the system. Yet, these changes have not been delineated to show the different forces and structural factors that perhaps pertain in the service of the public sphere (Babu, 2020). Educational research in general helps to account for the dynamics of policy discourses, followed by a variety of public interventions and their reflection in systems and people’s lives. Building the corpus of such research activities guides the critical function for public action in a democracy. The conception, approaches and elaborate narrations in this volume broadly convey the significance of carrying out interdisciplinary research. We seek to invite young scholars – future leaders in educational research – to appreciate these spaces as potential sites of research. In the global development discourse, education continues to play a critical role. It accelerates economic growth, promotes greater equity and is often referred to as a means to sociopolitical transformation and the overall prosperity of the nation (Tilak, 2018; Tilak & Choudhury, 2019). Education is

Introduction  3 considered a major transformative agent, because it produces benefits for the society. In addition to education’s direct contributions to economic growth and development (as discussed in human capital theory), it also produces many externalities that help to build a better society in terms of making individuals capable and self-reliant. In the context of human development, education becomes a major policy instrument in generating human capabilities (Sen, 1999). It also sets the agenda to address certain structural problems, such as equal opportunities for deprived communities based on caste, class, gender and religious minorities, in order to empower them with citizenship rights, human dignity and social well-being. Education is indispensable for the democratisation of society, in that it helps to stabilise the political system by creating well-informed citizens (Friedman, 1955). It helps in reducing socioeconomic inequality and to achieve higher social mobility (Singh, 2016). Therefore, the contribution of education (both in school and at higher levels) to the development and sociopolitical transformation of society is recognised all over the world. It is increasingly being viewed as an instrument of personal and social progress. Many studies conducted during the last half-century have established the decisive role of education in the development and well-being of society. In developmental thinking, education figured as a source of economic growth until the late 1980s and became a powerful tool for social progress and human development in subsequent years, specifically in the human development paradigm of the 1990s. Investment in education is not just a step towards the improvement of productivity and better income distribution, but also towards fostering civilised citizens (Comim, 2007: 96). It is considered a public good, a merit, a human right and an investment – a critical one – for individual and national progress (Tilak & Choudhury, 2019). Access to education promotes economic growth and reduces income inequality, which in turn leads to more cohesive, stable and happy societies (IIASA, 2018). It promotes civic culture, healthy democratic practices and social harmony, through the production of well-informed and learned citizens. Recent works have also established education’s close connection to sustainable development, in the broader framework of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (Bengtssor et al., 2018; Dodds et al., 2017; Harbe, 2014). Educated individuals are more aware of environmental and climate-related issues and therefore have a greater willingness and capacity to support pro-environmental policy changes (IIASA, 2018). Overall, gaining access to good quality education is a fundamental and defining characteristic of human society. Given the significance of being educated and its positive effects on the human condition and societal progress, there is consistent demand to increase the educational infrastructure, especially within developing societies. As a result, children from the poor and lower middle classes have gained access to schools and higher education institutions (HEIs) in large numbers. Even parents from marginalised sections of society forego the

4  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. opportunity cost of sending their children to get an education, which is relatively higher for them than for rich and middle-income households. Currently, around 1,345 million students attend schools (at the primary and secondary levels) all over the world, with a fair representation of children from underdeveloped and developing economies (UIS, 2019). Similarly, the number of students enrolled globally in higher education increased from 100 million in 2000 to 221 million in 2017 – more than double in two decades – and by 2040, student enrolment in higher education is predicted to surpass 590 million (Martin & Godonoga, 2020). Similar to the global trends, the education system in India has expanded rapidly in the last seven decades, since independence. Currently, India has more than 1.5 million schools, with an enrolment of around 251 million students, and a higher education system with 993 universities, close to 40,000 colleges and 10,725 standalone institutions, with a gross enrolment ratio (GER) of 26.3 per cent (MHRD, 2019; UDISE, 2018). Increasingly, young Indians aspire to access higher education, and the country has a target of achieving a GER of at least 50 per cent by 2035 (MHRD, 2020). While the expansion of both the school and higher education sectors has helped India to reach a stage of massification (which is to be celebrated), it is equally important to analyse and identify the winners and losers in the expansion process, particularly in higher education. Has this expansion widened the access to education for under-represented groups and regions or has it widened inequalities? Though the inequality of educational opportunities has been significantly reduced in school education, the reality is quite different in higher education. Studies and policy debates often highlight major concerns about unequal access to and participation in higher education among different socioeconomic groups of the population. There are visible disparities between regions, and widening inequalities between poor and non-poor and between social groups; this is viewed as a growing social concern. The population groups that lag behind in accessing higher education include women, Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, ‘Other Backward Classes,’ Muslims, and the poor in all groups, particularly from rural areas (Thorat, 2016). In a recent study, Tilak and Choudhury (2019) find a significant difference in the gross attendance ratio (GAR) in higher education between the poorest and richest families, and quite surprisingly it has increased substantially over the years. In 2007–2008, the difference in the GAR between poorest and richest families was 29.5 per cent, and this gap went up to 43.5 per cent in 2013–2014. As in many other developing countries of the world, the education sector in India has been accompanied by the rapid growth of private schools and institution of higher education, particularly during the last quarter-century (Choudhury, 2020; Gupta, 2015; Nambissan, 2012; Sahoo, 2017; Singh, 2015; Singh & Colin, 2014; Tilak, 2009; Tilak & Choudhury, 2019; Tooley & Dixon, 2007; Varghese, 2015). Within the private sector, the education “for-profit” segment, largely market-driven, is growing fast. On the other hand, philanthropic and charity-based private education seem to be fast

Introduction  5 disappearing (Nambissan, 2012; Tilak, 2006, 2013). The contribution of the private sector to both school and higher education has raised concerns about equity, quality and efficiency. Currently, private fee-charging schools increasingly cater to a substantial portion of the primary-school going populations in India. Muralidharan and Kremer (2009) found that 28 per cent of the population of rural India has access to private schools in their villages, and interestingly, this share is more than 60 per cent in states such as Punjab and Haryana. They argued that the growth of private schooling, particularly at compulsory levels of education in India, signals increasing inequality in educational opportunity. With the growth of the private sector, the school education system in India has experienced a ‘hierarchy of accesses’ among different social groups (Juneja, 2014). Similarly, equity concerns in higher education have become a very serious issue, as students from lower-income families can hardly attend private institutions because of exorbitant tuition and other fees. Furthermore, students from low-income families face greater difficulty in obtaining the limited seats available in elite public institutions, such as the Indian Institutes of Technology, National Institutes of Technology, Indian Institutes of Management, etc., due to tough entry-level nation-wide competition.1 The representation of students in elite public higher education institutions is largely confined to economically well-off families. Rising income inequality2 has increased the challenges to access higher education (specifically quality higher education) in India for students from poor households, and as a result, they are persistently under-represented in institutions of higher learning (Tilak & Choudhury, 2019). The ever-growing private sector in education has changed the structure and composition of the education market in India. Therefore, it is important to understand the structural dynamics of education that do have significant policy implications in terms of planning, implementation and intended outcomes.

Education policy: text and context Education policy, an official blueprint of the government plan, deals with the educational sphere of the nation. It consists of overall schemes, rules and laws that steer the everyday functioning of the educational system. Since education is indispensable for human civilisation, education policy serves to realise a qualitative change in the human condition. Given the nature of deeply rooted structural inequalities in Indian society, the education policy is to bring reforms and course correction as part of the democratic process. India being a welfare state, education policy and social policy overlap, as they both focus on the targeted beneficiaries of these provisions, as well as realising distributive justice. Apart from the technicalities and bureacratic procedures in planning and execution, education policy is a tool to promote social equality and democratisation in society. In other words, education is partly about the aims a society sets for itself and explains the roadmap for how such objectives can be achieved.

6  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. Public policies in education are also oriented towards cultivating common cultural traits necessary for the creation of a democratic personality. This entails a transition from social theory to an analytical framework, which is more or less referred as ‘social’ education (Whitty, 2002). Today’s policy domain has become a specialised field, requiring competency in terms of its expert orientation, application and implementation. However, the effects of a policy may overshadow the actual problems, as policymakers always seek structured answers from direct policy outcomes. The technocentric orientation and mechanical application of government policy leave little room for critical reflection on a wide range of problems that the educational system confronts. Teaching methods, for instance, are sustained with disconnected pieces of information (knowledge). During the coronavirus pandemic, the authorities have been forced to shift classroom learning online, with little attention being paid to the sensitive issues of accessibility, affordability and the feasibility of providing the needed infrastructure to everyone, especially to marginal sections of the society. Administrative protocols justify the technicalities of academic governance, but they often prove less useful in reality. Hence, the technocentric approach barely explains the ‘social’ component in education, to account for real change, and to derive new meaning from the policy adaptations. Rather than being merely a technical exercise, education policy involves deep human relations mediated by the politico-ethical and cultural considerations needed to visualise a good society. Given the complex nature of society, education policy needs to comprehend the nature of that particular society, such as citizens’ aspirations, ideas about justice and different ways to engage with diversity. Decision-making in education then becomes a political act, and hence our political views influence both the questions the public asks and the answers they seek. However, we often underestimate how much educational practices occur within a specific cultural context and how this shapes the cultural and moral values that constitute that very context (Winch & Gingell, 2004). In other words, the shared aspirations of a society are collectively represented and expressed in its education policy discourses. This enables us to define and outline the problematic of education. It is in this context that the relevance and true meaning of education policy are defined. In the wake of democratisation, the republic of India has charted numerous developmental programmes. Education policies and their long-term objectives are considered a paradigm shift in social transformation. As an innovative domain, educational processes persuade young learners to germinate new ideas as well as to discover pragmatic solutions to our common problems. The confluence of transforming institutions in education and learning new cultural ideas is essential for social progress (Dewey, 2004 (1915)). This confluence serves to attain the goal of public action in order to guide good governance. Our commitment towards organisational democracy is to discover human potential and freedom by means of education. Eventually, structural transformation in education facilitates the growth of

Introduction  7 democratic organisations (Woods, 2011). The aim of a liberal democracy is to create conditions in which citizens are able to command the social and material resources needed for conducting a good life. To sustain a liberal democracy as just and stable, the citizens need to learn and internalise human values and honour the conception of citizenship as a moral trait. For analytical purposes, we broadly take into account four structural factors that mediate between education policy and democracy. First, the intention of the liberal model of development was to achieve overall progress through economic prosperity. But it was alleged that this would protect the interest of the ruling class. In fact, the policy alignment was an elitist project of education motivated by the logic of economic reproduction. Hence, it is not merely a project of the state but also an elite project, which sets its own priorities in the public policies in which education policy forms a major component. In other words, the democratic solution described in public policies by the nation-state is a variant of the elite solution. Second, in the development phase of policy formation and adoption, legislative bodies tacitly assume the power to designate implementation. Party politics and the power of the electorate determine whether to accept, modify or reject policies purely to garner the majority of voices. Experience shows that the electorate model of development often seeks shortterm gain that protects the majority’s interest. The majoritarian overturn compromises the long-term alternative world-view and knowledge. With the ‘tyranny of the majority’ in this mode of democracy, the majority electorate imposes educational solutions on the minority, who may not agree with them. Moreover, the secular-minded majority of parents, for instance, might not prefer to publicly fund religious educational institutions, which conflicts with the wishes of the minority population. Third, this model of development appears to accomodate diversity at a social cost, as if it compromised standards and quality in education. This does not hold true, as this model for an educational system guarantees equal opportunity to accommodate cultural diversity and embrace secular values. Discourses on inclusion and diversity in this particular context aim to transform elitism into massification, with the expansion of educational avenues. Fourth, the current market model of development suggests that an economic mechanism would include the preferences of a variety of (income) groups. In reality, it was the phase of creative destruction of the education system that ended the publicly funded system. In the face of market solutions, the liberal state sidelined its legitmate political rights to plan and envisage the future direction of education. The consumers of education (if not citizens) were allowed to hold political rights, to mobilise resources and create a new educational system that fits well into the market logic. Today, the simulation of markets seeks to resolve a multitude of problems in education that have gone unaddressed so far by the liberal democratic state. Ultimately, advantages shared between the state and the market drive out individual choices. Based on a performance-driven assessment, the former becomes inefficient and unreliable and the latter becomes efficient and reliable. These

8  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. are contentious issues in the liberal democratic system, which weaken the logic of educational theories. A political compulsion to meet various vested interests has complicated the conceptions and principles of democracy and education. Liberal democracy becomes a tool for gratifying narrow political interests and short-term material gains. Given the severe criticism it has faced from many quarters, liberal democracy has become the terrain of conflict and contestation. In a liberal democracy, conflicts become apparent due to the social characteristics of the agencies involved. For instance, parental aspirations, children’s pressure and the ruling party’s political interest are hardly recognised as shared viewpoints. The state has a legitimate role in preparing children to achieve the goal of democratic citizenship and thereby commands collective responsibility. Moreover, the legitimacy of the state in educating children becomes entangled with parents’ legitimate claims as to how their children are to be educated. It is also important to see how a community can legitimately say how its future citizens are to be educated. On the other side of the spectrum, the younger generation themselves need the autonomy that liberal democracy fundamentally entails. As the dominant ideology justifies the unequal distribution of resources through the inheritance of family wealth, individual life conditions are highlighted as policy issues, rather than the problems of normative structures of distribution. These conflicting interests have not let the liberal democratic structure appreciate public education as an autonomous entity. Rather than pluralist approaches representing diverse interests, education policies need to focus on the concentration of interest and power in relation to the accumulation of power, as well as the ideological meaning of cultural struggles within educational practices (Apple, 1982). In this context, we need to develop a nuanced framework for education that is possibly fair and legitimate in its own right. Otherwise, we lose our grip on an egalitarian worldview and the political project of social justice. In other words, liberal democracy stands for creating the conditions necessary to make educational systems, their contents and their processes inclusive and egalitarian. The democratic era in postcolonial India has been a period of experimentation, innovation and adventure and will continue to inspire present and future generations. What we should collectively cherish is that a movement for a publicly conducted and directed educational system is innovating for a democratic society. Conversely, democracy should always be in a state of renewal in which education is the prime mover. India’s cultural diversity and plurality of traditions are reference points for political analysts to describe the place and meaning of liberal democracy in India. Within a liberal democracy, the pluralist discourses recognise a comprehensive view of the complex relationship between group membership, self-understanding and the preconditions for leading a dignified life. For a just and stable pluralist liberal democracy, the state should devise appropriate policies to guide distributive justice. This can be examined on a case-by-case basis, within a particular context, against a range of other

Introduction  9 considerations and demands. Here, a pluralistic liberal democracy would mediate, as well as balance, the tensions between diverse assimilationist and accomodationist demands, within a wide range of institutional contexts. With the adoption of education policy and programmes, the liberal democratic state aimed to accomodate and sustain the diversity within its basic structure. In this context, education would create socially responsible citizens by helping them acquire certain capabilities and virtues that are useful for the functioning of a liberal democracy. The educational programmes outlined in the Right to Education are political responses meant to advance justice in education and reinforce social stability in a liberal democracy (Reidy, 2001). There was a consensus in these institutional arrangements – definitional, applicational and with a shared understanding – organised around education to deal with the complex problems of India’s democratic system. The purpose of education is also to meet the challenges of the nation, which is understandably complex, both historically and structurally. Moreover, in a democracy, an individual is an end in himself, and the primary purpose of education is to provide him with the widest opportunity to realise his potential. Maintaining the profound significance of the changes in and diffusion of knowledge, skills and value, education policy focuses on human resources to realise the nation’s prosperity. It follows a method of social reorganisation with a social perspective. Since attaining individual needs is a common desire for the welfare state, education policy by its all parameters contributes to individual growth and national progress. National politics, therefore, are very much embedded in these discourses. While defining a political agenda for education, the Kothari Commmission (1964) describes three challenges: strengthening democracy, defending the country’s freedom, and awakening the depressed masses to make sense of their rights to demand education, equality and better standards of living and civic life. The solution to these challenges largely rests with the people, who need a clear focus, deeper understanding, collective discipline, hard and sustained work and dedicated leadership. As a tool of development, education policy in postcolonial India has acquired a discursive power in the transaction of knowledge and transformation of society. The growth of educational institutions, expansion of educational opportunities and qualitative transformation in people’s lives support this fact. With the outreach to diverse sections of the population, the education system is now in a steady state, but at the same time, there is renewed national interest in maintaining the quality of education and research to integrate with the knowledge economy of the new global social order. For a democratic society, the urgent political agenda for education is to remove the pervasive structural inequalities that are deeply rooted historically, without undermining the potential to create new conditions for progress. As a result, along with their expansion, educational institutions themselves will be transformed Today, India’s education system charts out a wide range of social aspects, from its organization for institutional

10  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. diversity, to its teacher-student composition, to its academic programmes, to its disciplinary orientation and its complex modes of financing. The metamorphosis set into motion in education is directed towards acquiring and developing new skills needed for the labour force. Our approach is to take a critical look at the education policies of India historically and examine how structural transformations in the polity and economy have implicated education policy. With the onslaught of globalisation and market forces, the political economy of education especially has caused the current state of education, from the standpoint of Indian youth, young learners and researchers. In this context, a Dewian philosophical treaty is useful for the conception of a modern society, with a synthesis of democracy and education. Yet, it needs further explanation, given the complex matrix of the state and democracy, on the one hand and the political economy of education, on the other. We need to clarify how the liberal democracy is scripted, defined and defended in the constitution, how it has worked out, in the field of education policies, and its variations in actual practices and outcomes. There are internal variations in the liberal democratic process, which implicate education as well as social systems. The adoption of a particular policy or a specific scheme in a policy in a given context or time, for instance, should be seen in relation to the interplay of diverse special interests and power relations. A detailed enquiry into these forces and factors is necessary, to detect the undercurrents of the policies in play and their diverse reform strategies in governing India’s education. As the purpose of policy texts and expert opinion of them are widely circulated and debated, there is no need to elaborate on them further (see, for example, Ayyar, 2017). Instead, we aim to illustrate the narrative structure of power embedded in policy discourses, its operation in diverse areas of education and its wider implications for the state of education and society. Contextualising education within the narrative structures of public policies not only signifies its relevance to sustaining a democratic tradition but also unpacks the potential sites of conflicts and contestation within both democracy and the educational system. These conflicting views and interests could be resolved when policy discourses become the blueprints for legitimate political acts. A critical interpretative framework needs to be devised to outline new research questions that challenge the normative order and arrive at a nuanced understanding of the place of public policy in education or, for that matter, the place of education in public policy. Critical researchers may need to move beyond the bipolar view of policy implications for education and educational implications for policies, to recast their ideas to reflect how diverse dispositions affect people of different backgrounds and situations. This could enable the public to creatively engage with ideas of education informed by material conditions, power relations and ideological apparatuses. Sociological and anthropological studies, for instance, have broadened the field of education, providing tremendous scope for conceptual and empirical investigations with a new theoretical lense and analytical framework.

Introduction  11

Policy critique and educational experiences The public policies on education that are outlined by the state as a theoretical basis for pragmatic solutions are far different from what is carried out in practice. Instead of tackling problems outlined and expounded on in the substance of a policy, instrumental processes motivated by special interest groups, economic circumstances and international concerns drive out the specific situations, behaviours and conditions of the citizenry. When it coalesces into a structure, education policy acquires bureaucratic order, sources of funding and organised responses from educational outcomes. Among these procedures, it is the bureaucratic order that defines and determines the factors inherent in assessing good performance in education. In this regard, policy success or failure is often judged by the measured capacity for a desired behavioural change. This is often used as a tool to punish institutions, groups and individuals (both teachers and students) for causing educational failure by segregating and ranking them, based on an assessment of their performance. On the other hand, the opposite procedure is followed to objectively assess excellence, so as to make people and organizations eligible for incentives. However, many studies on educational inequalities in India have obviated these, given the objective formulation of assessments (Deshpande, 2018; Nambissan & Rao, 2013; Tilak & Choudhury, 2019; Velaskar, 2010). A book-length empirical study of Dalits highlights that education continues to be a potential site of the reproduction of social inequality and discrimination (Shah et al., 2020). The corpus of research adopted within the educational institutions adopted to study inclusive education has generated contradictory results, which exposes the discriminatory attitude and practices of teachers, fellow pupils and educational administrators. Consequently, the nation as a whole has produced and quantified a large number of failed educational institutions and systems with poor standards as the epitome of the poor academic performance of teachers and students. The field evidence suggests that there is little room left to challenge the deeper social and cultural inequalities. This is a narrow conception of policy, which intensifies social differences among institutions and communities. As a result, the bottom line is that this system produces asymmetrical relationships. The new technical order in education has created a more sophisticated way of reproducing traditional distinctions between different types of institutions and different sections of society. Despite much research, the real problems often remain outside of the ambit of policy instrumentalities. This does not mean that research does not have an effect in shaping policies. In India for instance, research continuously reinforces the policy shift towards targeted communities, by taking into account the problems of poverty as a perpetual cause for poor education. According to Stein (2004), this ‘culture of poverty’ is implicated by policymakers and practitioners at various stages of the policymaking process. The policy research carried out by policy think tanks across the world has been oriented towards economic reason, with a metalogic

12  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. of cause and effect, in order to treat education as an instrument, just like any other commodity. Similarly, governance and education policies have become new problems for enquiry, as both have been subjected to structural reforms necessitated by the neoliberal logic of education. The legal structures and mode of governance conceptualised in the education policies signal how authority is shifting in a continuum from a state-controlled to a market-controlled system (Clark, 1983). Adding more and more regulatory structures, coupled with continuous assessment at different stages (both horizontal and vertical) of academic practice, constitute and determine what is meant to be quality of education. The politics of accreditation is useful to serve excellence at the global scale, according to market demand (Ayyar, 2017; Marginson & Rhoades, 2002). The clash between academic value and market demands truncated the nature of research and research priority (Brew, 2001: 109–127). This has not only influenced the way policy discourses have been framed, experts opinions influenced, and the policies implemented but also has justified the objectification of those who were the subjects of reforms and transformation. Moreover, the organising principle for explaining development in educational research policy has an overriding expectation to maximise impact. Hence, generally, the existing research culture in education policies has not adequately provided critical views on the complex processes of education. An analysis of the way in which policies are conceived and excecuted could show how they have led to conflicts of interest; but little consensus exists on what counts as knowledge or what ‘the world of education’ means. Instead of describing a policy as it appears, education research needs to critically examine the contextual factors and their structural properties that set the policy discourses (Anderson & Holloway, 2020) and their discursive regularities. This involves a whole range of relations, such as concept formation, its objective conditions and subjective positions, the ideologies of material factors and their specific political functions for unification. New approaches in policy studies challenge the dominant policy paradigm with the interpretative traditions developed in contemporary social science research, especially cultural studies. This encourages us to expose the hidden meaning of policies, through critically examining the various modes of communication between actors and agencies in education, to engage with new possibilities for democratising educational institutions and advancing social justice. Many of these concerns rest precisely on how equity is understood and practised (Marginson, 2017) at different course of educational practices.

Education: a field of interdisciplinary research Conventional education policy studies were narrowly conceived based on a positivist approach. As a result, they undermined values and ethical consideration. Employing a particular disciplinary framework in studying education policy not only focuses on the formal learning and institutional spaces

Introduction  13 but also limits the overt conflict in policy and politics centred on the power of the government. This disciplinary parochialism inhibits progress in epistemological and theoretical advancements. Similarly, a lack of education references weakened education policy analysis to ameliorate socio-educational problems (Prunty, 1985). Therefore, education policy studies need to guide an interest in research both in education and policy, as they discursively produce power and social or cultural theory. Moreover, for analytical purposes, the distinctiveness and overlapping of education and policy hold broader interest for studies of power in education and society. Here, a critical understanding with an interdisciplinary perspective becomes imperative in studying education. It is important to critically evaluate conventional methods, as well to develop new criteria in the education field. Studies on education policy take two distinct approaches: ‘analysis of the policy process’ and ‘analysis for and in the policy process.’ If the former seeks to understand the policy, policy- making, and its contents, related institutions and procedures, the latter raises concerns about improving policies, decision-making and problem solving. Although the first approach has become significant in education policy studies in the critical tradition, it maintains a democratic commitment to influence policy with regard to initiation, procedure and content. But this approach is neither a problem-solving method nor a demonstration of how policy frames the problem. Instead, it acknowledges the political and cultural dimensions of the education policy, both as means and ends. Indeed, the critical tradition evokes the moral stand to combine analysis and critical advocacy (Prunty, 1985). With arrival of the welfare state, there was a contract between state power, on the one hand, and knowledge, on the other. The social reform strategies adopted by the welfare state coincided with progress in intellectual reforms. According to its own developmental priorities, the state would rely on academic establishments and the development of social sciences to support general plans for social and economic change. For their part, social scientists collect empirically based data and supply basic inputs to make research relevant in policy formulation. This particular kind of relationship describes the social and democratic agenda of reforms. The research and policy exemplified in educational planning takes into account a rational and systematic analytical approach to the process of educational development (Coombs, 1970). It strives to make education more effective and efficient in response to the needs of students and society. Contradictions within welfare schemes and their limited impact on target groups and the society at large deterred scholars from earlier alliances with state power. They began to seek different ways to address problems and choose topics for policy science. However, their roles were diminished with the introduction of neoliberal policies and neoconservativism. As a result, the social sciences came to seem irrelevant, especially those elements directly linked to social welfare programmes. Instead of sharing a common sphere of policymaking and research to understand the nature of social problems, an expansion of the market for ministerial contract

14  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. research was encouraged. Within the critical tradition, particular interest developed to consider education policy as public policy by articulating the definition of “public” in education, to justify their politics against the wave of privatisation and commoditisation of knowledge. With the onslaught of globalisation, education policies and governance have transformed the educational system to integrate the knowledge economy. In the global era, there is a high risk of academic cosmopolitanism that questions all types of parochialism (Maarten Simons & Peters, 2009). Yet, this calls for critically oriented research to appreciate a shared universal value. Globalisation opens up fresh approaches in studying education policies and practices in regional, national and global contexts, to develop alternative policies against the neoliberal agenda and alternative paradigms committed to democracy and global justice (Appadurai, 2006; Razvi, 2006). Its discursive power relation contexualises multiple factors in defining, constructing and framing the problematic of education as an interdisciplinary field. In other words, the relationships between policy and research and between power and knowledge have become the site of interdisciplinary research in education. The production of social science knowledge – theoretical as well as empirical – has brought about many social insights for policymaking (Thorat & Verma, 2017). Social science studies (SSR) by and large have confined their research to conventional disciplinary domains. As discussed earlier, these have shifted towards interdisciplinary studies. The emphasis on practical outcomes of SSR makes clear the need to collaborate across disciplines and to work beyond the disciplinary boundaries. Furthermore, with the emergence of several new and unconventional areas in the social sciences, the research and policy focus has largely been oriented towards interdisciplinary works noticed in the last three decades. It is argued that interdisciplinarity provides new methodologies and innovative areas of inquiry, the goal of which is not just to look at the same objects from a new perspective, but to examine new objects that have previously not been considered noteworthy. Interdisciplinary research and knowledge production is path-breaking, far-reaching and non-linear in its effects, compared to what its counterpart does within the confines of the discipline (Gurukkal, 2018). Knowledge generated beyond disciplines and across their interfaces is strikingly fresh, regenerative and converging (Phillips, 1976). Social science needs both to frame and to ground interdisciplinary works to understand their social context, which is critical to both the inputs and outcomes of development research and particularly true in a complex society such as India. Of late, the National Knowledge Commission (NKC) report (2009) has underlined the features of interdisciplinary research that is rapidly growing in the global context; but in India, such studies have not been adequately represented in the research field. Several policy documents have advocated the fostering of interdisciplinary research in the social sciences, arts and humanities in the country. The National Education Policy 2020, for instance, emphasises the integration of higher education with research, keeping interdisciplinarity as

Introduction  15 the central focus. It proposes cross-disciplinary and interdisciplinary thinking, to create new forms of knowledge (MHRD, 2020). Education as a field of enquiry takes the lead in advancing interdisciplinary research in the social sciences. With an interdisciplinary approach, education is often seen as an interesting subject for the production of new knowledge, with new insights. Emerging interdisciplinary scholars in educational studies, however, may find they are not fully accepted by some groups, specifically in the context of developing countries, such as India. The exponential growth of educational institutions and the diverse disciplinary and interdisciplinary practices in teaching and learning is encouraging young researchers to identify new areas as potential sites of research. A modest attempt is made in this volume to introduce ways to situate the significance of education policy research, which primarily occupied divergent contexts, circumstances and spaces. It introduces examples of ongoing educational research carried out by young scholars who are committed to valuing research which informs policy and practice with a different approach. Compiling this diverse research work will, we hope, contribute to the public understanding of education as well as to professional practices and policy decisions within education.

Structure of the volume This volume underscores the significance of carrying out interdisciplinary research in the field of education. The interplay of policy discourses and their structural undercurrents are major areas of the study of educational transformation. This study evokes the discourses, surrounded by education policies and their consequences for the educational system and society. It also examines the structural determinants of the social, economic, cultural and spatial factors in education, in light of field investigations and empirical details. Moreover, the complexity embedded within the democratic system defines what it means to be educated and what being educated is. However, education policies and goals have been redefined in the context of market economy and globalisation. The neoliberal framework has led to the adoption of more technicalities of academic governance in education. The compounding effect of these factors makes education more complex. In this context, interdisciplinary research becomes critical for studying education in contemporary India. While diagnosing structural problems such as poverty, the educational status of the hinterlands of tribal settlements, the educational scenario in an urban landscape, the chapters in this volume navigate new sites of discrimination and complex forms of exclusion in the institutional spaces of the educational system. Questions are also posed on the marginalisation of minorities in accessing educational avenues, the determinants of the job market in exercising choices of studies and the expansion of vocational education, given the changing nature of the job market. Explanations given in the chapters reveal the causes of failures in education policies. They

16  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. also describe how the everyday process within the educational system was affected, especially the disastrous consequences for the lives of young learners. Without going into the objective conditions to craft and present a detached observation of empirical evidence on the educational scenario, every contributor in this volume is a critical observer in their own right to outline the problem, initiate techniques for investigation and craft their ideas. This volume engages with the experiential realities of young researchers, whose application of a critical lens reinforces the relevance of social theories in educational studies because of their affective orientation. Subsequently, these ideas were presented in a conference, followed by series of discussions and negotiations back and forth with the contributors to this volume. Being introduced in the form of case studies, ethnographic accounts and quantitative methods, the chapters contextualise multiple sites of a common-sense view on education policy, educational practices and educational research. We initiate a debate to build a perspective to contextualise educational studies in India, but not to be exhausted with the themes and problems discussed in these chapters. The contributors in this volume and their research work are representational not only in shaping a critical view on policy and practices but also in being represented through their own experience as young researchers. The book recontextualises educational studies by integrating policy discourse, interdisciplinary methods and educational practices. Outlining a perspective could shape future research enquiries in education. The chapters in the book are based on first-hand information and data collected from extensive fieldwork covering diverse regions, groups and issues. With interdisciplinary training, young researchers attempted to collect primary information from the field, using both qualitative and quantitative techniques. A quantitative method, for instance, offers vivid inferences on the developmental indices where education is placed as a vital component. This is a useful device to count how the market shapes and structures the education sector. On the other side, the discursive field of education and the actual discourses generated through constant and consistent pedagogical practices and people’s involvement have set new grounds for empirical investigation. Capturing the experience of education within these settings has broadened the conceptual framework and methodological tools to delineate the actual process of education. Ethnographic studies provide detailed descriptions of how education becomes meaningful for the variety of agencies and actors involved in it. This also generates the social and political context of such meaning-making and uses of culture, material resources and power relations by the agencies involved in the process of education. The educational environment and the researchers’ diverse political dispositions, especially the location of the researcher, and their empirical reflections have well merited a book-length discussion. Considering these questions, this volume organises the debates around four broad research concerns. First, the book explains and elaborates on the current scenario in

Introduction  17 education and future directions for further research. Second, with semi-ethnographic accounts, some of the chapters set the micro-educational scenario and its internal dynamics. Another set of chapters examines the social geography of education and urban marginality as new sites reproducing inequality in education, with further consequences for society. The final set of chapters addresses the incursion of market forces into education, which rapidly restructures the entire educational system. This elaborates on pro-market policies that have transformed the Indian education system and brought complexities into the field.

Organisation of chapters The volume is organised around four sub-themes. The first section provides ethnographic details which account for and articulate the outstanding issues of equity, access and inclusion in school education. The second section discusses the places for women and minorities in higher education. The third part of the volume probes into the educational problems of urban youths, which reproduces new forms of marginality in India. The fourth and final section comprises a collection of chapters that analyse the intersectionality of education, knowledge and the labour market. Particularly, it emphasises the emerging discourse on skills, training and aspirations of graduates, given the varying nature of job market, which is largely due to the intervention of technology. Using both primary and secondary data, two chapters in this section (Chapters 8 and 9) examine the issue of education using econometric techniques. However, both of these chapters substantiate their findings using qualitative evidence from the field. These chapters, in fact, demonstrate the significance of establishing linkages between skills, knowledge and the labour market, within the framework of education policy. Ethnographic accounts on equity, access and inclusion in education With the introduction of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, there has been an improvement in access to elementary education. Yet, access to good quality education remains a challenging issue in India. To achieve quality education, the state has shifted its policy focus from input-based to outcome-based targets. This policy shift aims to improve school effectiveness, as measured in terms of equal opportunity for schooling and equitable learning outcomes within the framework of inclusive and quality education as enshrined in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The school merger policy is one example of this policy shift. The first chapter takes into account the school merger policy implemented in Rajasthan. Findings reveal that the school merger policy has deviated from the policy descriptions, due to its methodological problems. The way schools were identified and merging strategies adopted have undermined the core issues of the

18  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. students and their education. The closing down of many schools as a result of the merger policy has also implicated the right of students to access education in their neighbourhood. Chapter 2 explores the different strategies adopted to ensure inclusive education for tribal schools under Multilingual Education (MLE) programme in Odisha. The modes of instruction, transaction and artefacts under this programme aim to reduce the gap between formal schooling and the community. This chapter deals with the question of community participation and its critical role in the process of tribal education. Through ethnographic details, this study recounts the contribution of the community’s knowledge in framing the curriculum and preparing instructional materials for MLE schools. The MLE schools in the study seek to gather every possible local resource to improve teaching and learning. This study explores how local artefacts become inclusive pedagogical activities to generate an immediate cultural context in the minds of young learners. Non-academic participation by the community has provided a space for students to express their creativity and link local knowledge to the school curriculum. This demonstrates how the indigenous activity of the community lets students learn about their culture, which shapes the formal education and learning outcomes. Place of women and minorities in education Two chapters introduced in this section highlight the place of women and minorities in higher education. Chapter 3 underlines the marginalised status of women in higher education in India, on account of their unmet educational needs. This study demonstrates the role of the private single-sex university, which attracts a large number of young women by showcasing the aesthetically appealing and safe campus in Rajasthan. Based on the field ethnography, it investigates how the reproduction of patriarchal norms continues in a ‘ghettoised gendered space.’ The narratives demonstrate that the use of persuasion that the young women’s education will take place in a safe and secure environment within the private sector is the site of old norms of control. Moreover, new forms of modernised control have been instituted, which indicates that we need to change the lens of focus to view this new form of boundaries and restrictions that repress the gendered bodies of educated young women. Despite many status reports and policies for the amelioration of the living conditions of minorities in India, the Sachar Committee report in 2006 revealed how the discrimination and exclusion of the Muslims is perpetuated in India. In this context, Chapter 4 examines the impacts of socio-economic and political dimensions on the educational status of the Muslim minority community in one of the north-eastern states of India, Manipur. It presents comparative data to highlight the lacuna of the awareness-cum-professional programmes related to the educational sector as well

Introduction  19 as the decrease in percentage of the reservation meant for minority groups in education and employment. By exploring the Pangal community, the most disadvantaged among the Muslims community in Manipur, this chapter delineates the historical and structural problems of their backwardness in education and employment. Youth, urban marginality and education: a contested terrain The city space today is not only an important site of rapid urban transformation but a social site of discrimination and socio-economic disparities. Urban marginality is a complex socio-spatial process that poses challenges to social policy, as it seeks to realize normative conditions, including education. Given the socio-spatial nature of urban marginalities, and of embedded aspirations, Chapter 5 maps out the aspirations of youth in an unauthorised colony in Delhi, as they navigate pathways towards higher education and the labour market. The chapter explores whether geographical disadvantages overlap with educational aspirations and the post-school pathways available for educated youth. The findings reveal that youth use formal schooling, informal supplements and the shadow educational system to bridge the shortcomings they may incur in schools, when it comes to pursuing higher education and securing a job. Comparing two educational institutions in the urban marginal spaces of Delhi, this ethnographic work interprets the new strategies adopted by the youth to cope up with urban lifestyle. Chapter 6 investigates the educational choices available for the Gujjars in India. This study employs ethnographic methods to examine these issues in an urban village in Delhi. The data is collected using kinship mapping, wherein families are identified based on lineage. The genealogy of intergenerational educational mobility is traced and discussed, using family trees. The findings show that the shift in educational choices is due to the role of systemic and community forces, as well as the cultural ethos of the parents of the Gujjar community in the urban peripheries. Moreover, the study reveals a significant relationship between education and the material benefit which has downplayed the importance of education for overall growth. The stereotype attached to the community plays a significant role in hindering the process of smooth acceptance of community members in institutions of higher learning. The study aspires to add to the scant literature available on urban Gujjars through the lens of the sociology of education. Chapter 7 examines the dynamics of the linguistic hegemony of the English language in higher education. Acquisition of the English language has become a contested site in higher education, which implicates students of diverse backgrounds in the process of knowledge-production within the university classroom in a metropolitan university space. The study endeavors to theorize the role of English in producing hurdles within inclusive pedagogical practices and knowledge transaction in a university space.

20  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S. Knowledge and the labour market: redefining skill and aspirations The knowledge-based economy has pushed the expansion of knowledge-based industries (KBIs) and higher education institutions (HEIs). The knowledge workers engaged in KBIs and produced by HEIs have been considered the driving force for fostering regional parity through economic development. Even though India is a service economy wherein higher education has entered into the stage of massification, the concentration of KBIs, as well as HEIs, has come up in limited pockets. Employing the mixed-method approach and sequential explanatory research design with the macro-data set, this chapter suggests that the states which specialize in KBIs also specialize in HEIs. While analysis at the meso level suggests that the clusters of KBIs in the country have a maximum concentration of HEIs, the analysis of primary data at the micro level finds that KBIs hire maximally from the HEIs located in proximity. Hence, this study summarises that KBIs, as well as HEIs, hold spatial preferences for each other which is very profound around populous urban agglomerations. The expansion in higher education has improved the enrolment of students, which is largely visible in the social sciences. Against this backdrop, Chapter 9 seeks to explore the factors that an undergraduate student considers in deciding whether to pursue post-graduate education in the social sciences, using student survey data from two undergraduate colleges in Delhi. This study suggests that more than the returns (net benefit), interest in the subject, course content and future work aspirations influence the decision to pursue post-graduate education in social science. It is argued that the human capital theory cannot solely explain the growing demand for the social sciences, particularly in the public sector. The perception of students about the linkage between education and the labour market feeds into the decision of graduates and influences the demand for social science courses in higher education. Perceptions about the labour market, interest, individual preference and future aspirations are of central importance in understanding the decision-making process for students pursuing higher studies in the social sciences. Chapter 10 explores the possibilities of imparting vocational training at university and college campuses across India, as an integrative model. Over time, vocational education in India has adopted innovative ideas with a new perspective with reference to the University Grants Commission (UGC) guidelines. Some higher educational institutions have established and experimented with undergraduate level vocational courses, demonstrating their economic viability and inclusiveness. Introducing a case of this innovative model at the Tata Institute of Social Science (TISS) campus, this study assesses the quality, scalability and cost-effectiveness of the course and the potential for replicating similar models at other educational institutions.

Introduction  21 The courses are organised in partnership with industry experts and training institutes, and enable students to acquire practical skills on the premises of industry partners. In less than a decade, this course has not only succeeded in terms of more intake but expanded the industry network for providing practical skills and guaranteeing employment.

Conclusion Keeping in view the specialised research locations, this volume merits three considerations. First, it introduces the studies carried out by young researchers trained in education to designate a fresh approach to existing educational problems. Our effort here is to ensure the representation of young scholars and their intellectual voice on the critical issues on education through empirical evidence, with the aid of acquiring specialised guidance for interdisciplinary research. Second, although education policies are designed with well-intended goals and strategies, research studies soon move into the mode of policy evaluation. Beyond normative considerations, the chapters in this volume take critical views of the consequences of policy discourses, discursive practices and the implications of power relations on ideologies and cultures in the educational field. Third, the volume elucidates the unintended consequences of policies in education with the careful application of an interdisciplinary method. It is assumed that such a method unpacks approaches hitherto taken for granted in policy and developmental thinking and reflects alternative modes, to visualise education in light of empirical evidence. This volume contributes a nuanced understanding of the key and emerging issues in the domain of both school and higher education in India: educational choices, gender inequality, language discourse, knowledge and the labour market, minorities, youth and urban marginalities. The intensive engagement of young researchers in the field has brought about interesting insights, which have shaped their analyses, arguments and inferences. This volume provides valuable insights to some grey areas of educational research in India and also addresses policy options. With the use of both theoretical and empirical approaches, the volume has raised some concerns about the Indian education system. Taking into account the view of the targeted groups, the approaches being adopted go beyond policy-centric factual based research. Given the changing landscape of education in India, it forecasts the intersectionalities of region, gender, class, caste and minorities in the contemporary educational scenario. In sum, research on the education system in contemporary times needs to foster an interdisciplinary approach. While covering diverse issues with a deep understanding from the field, we hope this volume inspires further research.

22  Pradeep Kumar Choudhury and Suresh Babu G. S.

Notes 1 Public higher education institutions in India follow certain affirmative action policies to admit students from some social groups, such as Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, and other so-called backward classes. However, recently, a reservation policy was framed to admit students from poorer economic groups, as well. 2 The findings of the World Inequality Report 2018 (as reported in The Hindu, 14 December, 2017) reveal that the income share of India’s top 1 per cent rose from approximately 6 per cent in 1982–1983 to around 23 per cent by 2014, and that of the top 10 per cent increased from 10 per cent to 56 per cent during this period.

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Part I

Equity, access and inclusion in school education

1 Problems of equity and access in education A case of school-merging policy Aysha Malik

India’s education system has achieved great development in school education through the successful implementation of many programmes and policies. These efforts have been reflected in schemes, programme interventions and policies such as Operation Black Board (OBB, 1987–88),1 the Shiksha Karmi Project (SKP2), the Andhra Pradesh Primary Education Project (APPEP), the Bihar Education Project (BEP), the U.P. Basic Education Project (UPBEP), Mahila Samakhya (MS), the Lok Jumbish Project (LJP),3 Alternative Schools,4 the District Primary Education Programme (DPEP)5 and the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA)6 movement, the flagship centrally sponsored scheme for Universal Elementary Education (UEE) across the country, carried out in partnership with state governments. Its predecessor, the Right to Education Act (RTE) of 2009, was also a significant initiative taken up by the government of India. Under the RTE Act, every child aged 6 to 14 years is guaranteed free and compulsory education. This act carved out norms and standards that made it mandatory for the state to provide a school within reach of every child. The goal of the Savra Siksha Abhiyan and Education for All initiatives was to achieve universal elementary education throughout the country. The SSA was envisaged to provide full enrolment, with gender parity, social equity and quality education. Subsequently, the RTE Act, Section 6, defined neighbourhood schools: ‘School having Classes I–V shall be established within a walking distance of 1 km from the neighbourhood and school having Classes VI–VIII shall be established within a walking distance of 3 km from the neighbourhood’ (RTE, 2009). The act also states that in case of extreme physical conditions or in far-flung areas, the state shall make arrangements such as free transport, residential facilities, etc., to protect every child’s right to education. In order to achieve these objectives, in the last few years, the state has made schools available across the nation for almost all children in this age group. As a result, the number of primary schools increased from 638,738 in 2001 to 840,546 in 2015–2016. Similarly, the number of upper primary schools rose from 206,269 in 2001 to 147,544 in 2015–2016 (U-DISE, 2015–2016). Enrolment in these schools at the elementary level also reported a huge increase, cutting across caste and gender groups. The gross enrolment ratio (GER) in 2001 was 95.7 per

30  Aysha Malik cent at the primary level, which rose to 99.21 per cent in 2015–2016. At the upper primary level, the GER was 58.6 per cent, which rose to 92.81 per cent in 2015–2016. (U-DISE, 2015–2016). The first step towards achieving the goal of universal access to primary education is to make provisions for primary schooling in all areas. This has been achieved by providing primary schooling facilities within a walkable distance of all villages/habitations7 in the country. The All India School Education Survey (AISES) found that 91.21 per cent of habitations have a primary education facility within a walking distance of 1 km, and 87.58 per cent of habitations have an upper primary education facility within a walking distance of 3 km. As a result, out of a total of 1,137,833 habitations, 1,037,833 habitations (91.21 per cent) have primary education within a distance of 1 km, including 66.30 per cent with these facilities within habitations. About 96.19 per cent of the rural population had access to primary education within a walking distance of 1 km, including 84.79 per cent of the population, who had access to it within the habitations (NCERT, 2006). However, at the upper primary level, 87.58 per cent of habitations had access within a distance of 3 km, including 26.20 per cent with access within the habitations. From the population point of view, 92.81 per cent of the rural population had access to upper primary education within a distance of 3 km, including 50.60 per cent of the population with access within the habitations. Both access and participation in schooling facilities at the secondary and higher secondary levels have grown along with the elementary level, because of the introduction of RMSA. At the secondary school level, 84.56 per cent of the rural population had access to secondary education within 5 km, including 21.35 per cent who had it within the habitations. In India, 91.83 per cent of habitations had secondary school facilities within 8 km. About 74.88 per cent of rural habitations had higher secondary education within 8 km. Of these, 80.09 per cent of the rural population had access to higher secondary stage education within 8 km, including 10.28 per cent of the population with these facilities within the habitations (NCERT, 2006). The expansion of government-mandated school facilities under the centrally sponsored schemes and policies had two consequences: surplus schools and low enrolment schools. Low-enrolment schools have grown rapidly because of the growth in low-fee private schools with good learning outcomes. This led to the closer of government schools from 16 per cent to 31 per cent in a short period, i.e. from 2006 to 2014 (NCERT, 2006; Kindon, 2017). Moreover, several studies have raised the issue of poor quality education (Adhikari, 2001; Aggarwal, 2000; Goyal, 2007; Kingdom, 1996; Naik, 1975; Panigrahi, 2014; Tilak, 2011; Velaskar, 2010). These concerns were highlighted in the latest education policy documents, Samgra Shiksha Abhiyan 2018 and Rationalization of Small Schools across States 2017, which recommended that the development of school education must shift focus from physical expansion to the consolidation of the existing school

Problems of equity and access in education  31 system. They proposed to undertake a detailed exercise of school mapping, to identify schools with low enrolment and inadequate infrastructure. The concern that emerges, based on the population of our country, is the low levels of enrolment in government schools. According to the U-DISE data, 0.6 per cent of schools in the country have zero enrolment, 7.9 per cent schools have an enrolment of fewer than 15 students, and 26.3 per cent of schools have fewer than 30 students enrolled. (U-DISE, 2015–2016). The problem of these surplus schools was recognised because of the low enrolments, which could not efficiently utilise the resources possessed by small schools. This has affected the teaching and learning processes and also, monitoring and supervision. In this context, the rationalisation of small schools became a national debate. In Rajasthan, for instance, such processes were routed through the school merger policy in 2014. The success of the school merger policy in Rajasthan guided the rest of the states, such as Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Telangana, Jharkhand, Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir and Andhra Pradesh (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2017). In addition to merger policies, the focus was shifted to adopt an outcome-based approach, in which output-based indicators such as achievement level, examination results and the pass percentage of students in class became the focus. The following section discusses these policy changes in detail.

Paradigm shift in policy from quantitative measures to qualitative measures The Government of India has taken three initiatives to address the learning crises faced by the Indian educational system at the school level. In doing so, it has focused on output-based indicators, such as examination results, achievement surveys and quality-measurement indicators, unlike earlier approaches, which used input-based indicators for universal access to education, expanding opportunities, developing infrastructure and providing school facilities. The present policy’s paradigm change takes different objectives, to achieve qualitative outcomes. The three contemporary policies and programmes are highlighted here, to map out the policy shift from inputbased to outcome-based indicators. In July 2017, the Ministry of Human Resource Development released a document to the public domain to invite suggestions to formulate a policy on school rationalisation at a national level. The topic was the rationalisation of small schools across the nation to improve efficiency. The document outlined the need to better use resources, provide good quality education, ensure retention and rationalise schools. It stated that the school rationalization process should be carried out in consultation with parents, teachers, children and the community, to improve the functioning of the schools for better use of resources. The guidelines were formulated in accordance with the RTE Act, which stated that no child should be deprived of access to schooling. The need to rationalise small schools arises due to the fact that demand and supply may have changed

32  Aysha Malik at schools established a decade ago or more. The draft documents have underlined several targets/objectives for the rationalisation of small schools to see that all children have access to fully functional neighbourhood schools, expedite the resourcing of schools, improve the quality of education and ensure the retention of school children. All schools should confirm the norms and standards laid down by the RTE Act, which allows them to shift and reallocate staff and other resources that exceed the requirements to schools where they are needed, consolidate resources in the best interest of the students and minimise underutilisation and wasting of resources. The methodology adopted in the draft document of school rationalizations suggests procedures for rationalising schools. This specifies that every state shall adopt the school rationalisation process only after consulting the local authority to identify suitable locations for the rationalised school. The school management committee (SMC), teachers and students must be consulted for their opinions. Also, the relocation of a school should not occur suddenly, and no child should be adversely affected. The guidelines propose continuous monitoring of these schools, to determine the outcome for efficiency of the merger process and to track individual children enrolled in the merging schools. The guidelines clearly define basic norms for closing schools, which need to be followed, in view of the suggested objectives. The process for rationalizing small schools should adhere to the neighbourhood norms as defined in the RTE Act. The guidelines clearly require adherence to RTE norms for school enrolment and facilities. The policy’s main objective is to improve the quality of education for children and better use resources, such as school infrastructure, while monitoring schools, including teachers (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2017). Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan was introduced through the merging of the SSA, the RMSA and teacher education as a major school education development programme at the national level. The common objective of all of these schemes was to enhance access by promoting the inclusion of disadvantaged groups and to improve the quality of education for all, from the primary to the higher secondary levels. The merger of school policies was one of the major initiatives taken by Rajasthan, through which schooling facilities from Grade I to Grade XII were provided by creating new Adarsh Vidyalayas. Samagra Sikhsha Abhiyan and NEP 2020 named these Adarsh Vidyalayas as school complexes. The National Education Policy of 2020 also discussed the issue of small schools across all the states of India. According to U-DISE 2016–2017 data, nearly 28 per cent of India’s public primary schools and 14.8 per cent of upper primary schools have fewer than 30 students. The average number of students per grade in the elementary schooling system is around 14, with a notable proportion having fewer than six. In 2016–2017, there were 108,017 single-teacher schools, and the majority (85,743) were primary schools serving Grades 1–5 (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2020). Drafted guidelines published by MHRD for the rationalisation of small schools stated that these small schools have a negative effect on

Problems of equity and access in education  33 education and the teaching–learning process and also present systematic challenges for governance and management. Therefore, the Samagra Sikhsha scheme provides a possible mechanism for small schools through the establishment of a grouping structure called school complexes. These consist of one secondary school together with all other schools offering lower grades in its neighbourhood. The school complex/cluster will be more resource-efficient and have more effective functioning, coordination, leadership, governance and school management. Therefore, three contemporary initiatives – i.e. the rationalisation of small schools across states, Samagra Sikhsha Abhiyan and the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 – identify the issue of learning crises in these small schools and seek suggestions for consolidating schools based on norms.

Consolidation/rationalisation of schools and school merger policy The rationalisation of schools may be a new concept in India, but many countries globally have undertaken it. Differences have accrued, however, in identifying small schools, whether in the context of India or internationally. As Bray (1987) says, ‘small is a relative term and what one person may call a small school, another may call a large one.’ Moreover, primary and secondary schools have to be treated separately. A primary school with 180 pupils may be considered medium-sized, but a secondary school with 180 pupils may be small. If we take enrolment to define school size, a number of studies have analysed small schools (Cotton, 1996; Lee & Smith, 1996; Raywid, 1997; Raywid, 1999; Witt, 2011). While using enrollment in school as a vital predictor of the smallness of schools, limits as low as 250 and as high as 600 to 800 and beyond could be considered small in the context of international standards. But in India, defining ‘small schools’ is one of the biggest challenges and a crucial exercise in educational research, because there is no uniform definition for ‘small’ schools. In most parts of the country, these schools are characterised as one- or two-teacher schools in scattered locations with multiple grades of education and classroom situations (Diwan, 2015). The term ‘consolidation’ has been used in various policy analysis reports and articles, because this process of restructuring schools has been associated with different terminologies. In New York, they have used consolidated school districts.8 China has used school merger policy,9 and in the same way, the term is rationalised small schools in India. All three different locations have adopted different methodologies to identify schools and the merger process. Fitzwater (1953) defined consolidation as ‘the merging of two or more attendance areas to form a larger school.’ Nelson (1985) defines consolidation: School consolidation is the practice of combining two or more schools for educational or economic benefits. A consolidated school can offer

34  Aysha Malik an expanded curriculum and a more prominent identity in the community while reducing costs through economy of scale. On the other hand, consolidation can incur numerous liabilities, especially if the schools to be closed are the sole providers of community services. The MHRD lists schools temporarily closed in India in order to rationalise the availability of schools. Table 1.1 shows the statewise details of schools that were closed or merged. The highest number of schools that closed or merged was in Rajasthan; the proportion for that state alone was almost 50 per cent of the total schools closed in the nation. Many states, such as Telangana, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Punjab, Jammu and Kashmir and Odisha, have also rationalised small schools along with Table 1.1  Schools temporarily closed in India S.N. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

State/UTs Andaman & Nicobar Islands Andhra Pradesh Arunachal Pradesh Assam Bihar Chandigarh Chhattisgarh Dadra & Nagar Haveli Daman & Diu Delhi Goa Gujarat Haryana Himachal Pradesh Jammu & Kashmir Jharkhand Karnataka Kerala

Temporarily closed school

S.N.

15

19

Lakshadweep

3,485

20

Madhya Pradesh

486

630

21

Maharashtra

517

36 372 2 285 0

22 23 24 25 26

Manipur Meghalaya Mizoram Nagaland Orissa

21 13 26 1,041 104

0 46 130 483 445 102

27 28 29 30 31 32

Pondicherry Punjab Rajasthan Sikkim Tamil Nadu Telangana

5 955 15,800 38 0 159

265

33

Tripura

446 2,055 11

34 35 36

Uttar Pradesh Uttaranchal West Bengal Total

State/UTs

Temporarily closed school 2

8 2,149 535 1,142 31,809

Source: MHRD (2017), drafted document on the rationalisation of small schools for better efficiency.

Problems of equity and access in education  35 Table 1.2  Schools merged in Rajasthan, 2014 and 2016 Elementary

Secondary

Primary Upper primary Primary Upper primary Years School School Total School School 2014 2016 Total

358 1,743 2,101

68 51 119

426 12,223 1,794 447 2,220 12,670

1,911 678 2,589

Total

Total

14,134 14,560 1,125 2,919 15,259 17,479

Source: Department of Elementary Education, Government of Rajasthan.

the school merger in Rajasthan. But they have used different terms, such as the integration of small schools, rationalisation of schools and amalgamation of schools (Rao, 2016). In 2014, Rajasthan implemented a school merger policy at a macro scale. The main rationale for merging schools is to better distribute and utilise available resources, especially teachers. In Rajasthan, there were 17,479 schools merged in the state at both the primary and upper primary levels in 2015–2016. The main criteria used for merging schools were based on enrolment and distance. Table 1.2 shows the number of schools that were merged into elementary and secondary/higher secondary schools from 2014 to 2016. Since the norms of the merger policy were based on enrolment and distance, the minimum size of primary schools was to be less than 15 students, and 30 students for the upper primary level. Schools located within the RTE distance norms of 1 km at the primary level and 3 km for the upper primary level should be merged with secondary and higher secondary schools.

Data collection and methodology The present study comprises both primary and secondary data. The secondary data was collected from sources such as U-DISE, ASER, NCERT, MHRD, state education reports, policy documents and other related studies. The primary information was gathered from different stakeholders, such as school principals, Block Education Officers and students aged 6 to 18 years who were affected by the merger. Fieldwork was conducted in the two selected blocks of the Jaipur district in Rajasthan from December 2017 to January 2018. The purpose of selecting Rajasthan as a place of study was that it is one of the first states where rationalisation and school merging took place in the country. The consolidations were rapid, and a large number of schools were merged, around 17,479 schools in the first phase alone, which was one of the highest totals among the states in India. A systematic random sampling method has been used to identify the study area. The Jaipur district was selected on the basis of the highest number of schools that were merged in the state. Further, the two blocks

Total Schools (in Numbers)

36  Aysha Malik 300 276 200

168 134 104

100

79

57

55

48

45

43

41

28

25

24

24

22

18

0

Blocks in Jaipur

Figure 1.1   Block-wise merging of schools in Jaipur District (2013–2014 to 2015–2016). Source: U-DISE, 2013–2014 to 2015–2016.

were identified based on the highest and lowest number of schools that merged. Figure 1.1 represents the distribution of the 900 schools that were merged block-wise in the Jaipur district. The Amber block has the highest number of schools (276) that merged into the closest nearby school. On the other hand, the Sanganer block has the lowest number of schools (18) that were merged. To understand the outcome of the school merger policy in terms of increasing school structure and size, the increase in basic schooling facilities was mapped out for selected schools during the fieldwork. Furthermore, four village-level committees (panchayat samiti) among the two selected blocks were identified in consultation with Block Education Officers, based on village population and feasibility. Further, four Adarsh Vidyalaya (school complexes) were selected from these panchayat samiti. All schools selected were government schools, because the merger policy has been implemented only on those. A total of 60 students aged 6 to 18 years in the four selected panchayat samitis were randomly selected. This study focuses on school merger policy implementation and its impact at the ground level, in terms of changing school structure and size (enrolment change), and access to schools. It also explored the experiences of teachers, principals and administrative-level officers in the study area, with the introduction of the merger policy. An interview schedule was prepared and employed to collect data from different stakeholders, i.e. students, principals and educational administrators. After being collected in the field, the data was tabulated and analysed.

Analysis and interpretation Implementation of school merger policy in Rajasthan The aim of the study was to explore the implementation of the school merger policy and its impact on stakeholders such as students, school principals,

Problems of equity and access in education  37 teachers and educational administrators. During the interviewing of district- and block-level education officers, it was found that only departmental orders were circulated through the top-down administrative level, from the Rajasthan state education department to district education officers. Subsequently, the Block Education Officer was asked to list all small schools in their respective administrative units and then forward the list of schools to the directorate of school education. A list of the small schools was prepared by the administration, which were merged with nearby Adarsh vidhalaya. It was noticed from the field that the views and opinions of the local community, principals and school teachers were not taken into consideration in the process of merging schools. The government of Rajasthan has not adopted any stringent and systematic methodology to identify schools that need to be closed or merged. Rajasthan’s Education Minister10 stated that ‘the idea of school merger was to pool-in resources at one place to ensure availability of teachers and bring education to the same level,’ to increase efficiency and rationalise the utilisation of resources, especially teachers. Many schools were declared not viable because of low enrolment or the presence of other schools nearby. These schools were closed down and their staff and students were moved to the nearest upgraded schools. Of 17,479 schools being merged, Jaipur was reported to have the highest number, as shown in Figure 1.2. Its purpose was to improve internal efficiency in the education system, better utilise resources, and promote teacher accountability, easy monitoring, supervision and efficient outcomes in terms of the quality of education (Rajasthan Council of Elementary Education, 2015– 2016). In 2016, under the Adarsh Vidyalaya Yojana, 10,000 schools were upgraded to ‘Adarsh Vidyalaya’ in all panchayat of the state for adequate infrastructure, sufficient enrolment and aiming for excellence in learning outcome. Adarsh Vidyalaya was an outcome of the school merger policy having all infrastructural facilities. The National Education Policy (NEP)

Total School (No)

1000 800 600 400 200 0

Districts Name

Figure 1.2  District-wise merger of schools in Rajasthan (2013–2016). Source: U-DISE, various years.

38  Aysha Malik 2020 designated these schools a ‘school complex,’ consisting of one secondary school together with all other schools offering lower grades in its neighbourhood, including Anganwadis,11 in a radius of 5 to 10 km. As stated in the NEP 2020, an Adarsh Vidyalaya includes sports and cultural activities. Apart from the Adarsh Vidyalaya Yojana and Utkrisht Vidyalaya Yojana (model schools), the Rajasthan state took up a pilot project of the PPP model; 300 schools were considered under this scheme in 2017. A decentralised management system in education was introduced with the appointment of the Panchayat Elementary Education officer (PEEO). The principal of the Adarsh Vidyalaya of every panchayat monitors school infrastructure, including the availability of teachers in their respective panchayat. Changing structure of schools before and after school merger policy The greatest change in the number of schools was found at primary to higher secondary schools, i.e. from 0.12 per cent in 2013–2014 to 12.38 per cent in 2015–2016. District-wise, the number of schools12 that have been merged or are in the process of merging is shown in Figure 1.2. The Jaipur district reported the highest number of schools merged. The structure of schools has also changed in the process of school merger, as one analyses the total number of schools according to their levels. Schools with primary facilities decreased from 45.81 per cent in 2013–2014 to 39.45 per cent in 2015–2016. But schools with upper primary, secondary and higher secondary facilities increased from 0.12 per cent in 2013–2014 to 12.38 per cent in 2015–2016. Those schools that had undergone the process of the merger were referred to as composite schools, Adarsh Vidyalaya or Utkrisht Vidyalaya.13 As data reveal the restructuring of schools before (Table 1.3) and after the implementation of the school merger policy (Table 1.4) in Rajasthan, four newly created schools (Adarsh Vidyalaya) were studied in detail, in terms of changing school structure and size (number of students studying in school) and upgrading to Adarsh Vidyalaya. A profile of these four selected schools in four panchayat samitis is given in Table 1.5, with their changed structure after the school merger process. With co-educational facilities, all four selected sample schools have been managed by the department of education, Government of Rajasthan. The U-DISE codes of these schools were closed by the department once they were merged. Among the four selected schools, three were upgraded as Adarsha Vidyalaya in 2015–2016. All schools are accessible by well-connected roads and have Hindi as a medium of instruction. Two types of schools were closed and merged into the newly created school, where one type of school exists within the campus of the newly created schools, but they were managed and run by two separate principals. Now, however,

Problems of equity and access in education  39 Table 1.3  Status of schools in Rajasthan before the merger policy: 2013–2014 to 2015–2016 Levels of Schools in Rajasthan

Total Schools

% Total

% Government

Primary only Primary with upper primary Primary with upper primary, secondary and hr. secondary Upper primary only Upper primary with secondary and hr. secondary Primary with upper primary, secondary Upper primary with secondary All schools

54,774 38,565

45.81 32.25

57.48 27.12

5,756

4.81

0.12

0.2

0.26

4,147

3.47

4.22

8,934

7.47

8.16

7,156 119,574

5.98 100

2.64 100

242

Source: U-DISE, various years, 2013–2014 to 2015–2016. Table 1.4  Status of schools in Rajasthan after the merger policy: 2013–2014 to 2015–2016 Levels of Schools in Rajasthan Primary only Primary with upper primary Primary with upper primary, secondary and higher secondary Upper primary only Upper primary with secondary and higher secondary Primary with upper primary, secondary Upper primary with secondary All schools

Total Schools % Total % Government 42,577 37,428

39.45 34.68

50.58 29.76

15,297 228

14.17 0.21

12.38 0.29

1,176 10,827 398 10,7931

1.09 10.03 0.37 100

1 5.7 0.29 100

Source: U-DISE, 2013–2014 to 2015–2016. both schools are managed by one PEEO, with a single U-DISE code. Other merged schools were those located in the same panchayat samiti within a radius of 2 km to 3 km. Due to the increasing distance between habitations and schools after the implementation of this policy, many schools have been demerged for violating RTE norms and after receiving criticism from local people. Moreover, since the merger policy followed under the PPP model in one senior secondary Adarsh Vidyalaya, Kukas has partnered with the Honda vehicle company for school infrastructure.

School Name (New School)

Senior-Secondary Adarsh Vidyalaya, Kukas, Amber Senior Secondary Adarsh School, Rampura Dabdi, Jalsu Panchayat Samiti, Amber Upper Primary School, Jayrajpura Senior Secondary Adarsh School, Nevta Panchayat Samiti, Sanganer

Source: Fieldwork, 2017.

Merged School Name

Level of School before Merger

Level of School after Merger

Upgrade of School

Primary School, Kukas Primary School, Balayaon Ki Dhani, Primary School, Rampura Dabdi Primary School, Khatiyon Ki Dhani Primary School, Nanakpura Primary School, Ganesh Vihar Government Primary School, Newata Primary School, Chalabriyon ki Dhani

(Upper Primary with Secondary Level) in 2013–2014

Primary facility with Upper Primary and Secondary

Upgrade of School with Adarsh Vidyalaya in 2015–2016)

Upper Primary with Secondary and Higher Secondary Levels) in 2013–2014

Primary Facility with Upper Primary and Secondary Levels

Upgrade of School with Adarsh Vidyalaya in 2015–2016

(Primary with Upper Primary Level in 2013–2014)

Same Level as Before Merger, with Provision of Primary with Upper Primary

School Has Same Structure as Before Merger

(Primary with Upper Primary Level) in 2013–2014

Primary Facility with Upper Primary Secondary and Higher Secondary Levels

Upgrade of Adarsh Vidyalaya in 2015–2016)

40  Aysha Malik

Table 1.5  Profile of Adarsh Vidyalaya and merged schools in two blocks of Jaipur

Problems of equity and access in education  41 Change in school size in relation to prescribed norms Schools were merged into four Adarsh Vidyalaya based on their level of schooling and enrolment in 2013–2014. No school had an enrolment below 15 pupils or was run by a single teacher. All schools had an enrolment above 15 students, which exceeds the norm set in the school merger policy of Rajasthan, and the infrastructure of the schools is in good condition, with more than five to fifteen classrooms in every newly created school. One of the most important concerns about merging schools is that they may not have followed the basic norms prescribed in the merger policy. However, all schools merged into the four selected schools had more than 15 students enrolled and two to five teachers in the school. The basic norms of enrolment and distance for the closure of schools has not been followed in the process of the merger. All schools that were selected had more than one teacher and had buildings with all basic facilities including infrastructure, water and sanitation. As stated by the principals of newly created school complexes (Adarsh Vidyalay), the distance of schools from the newly merged school was found to be more than 1 km from the neighbourhood. Table 1.6 highlights the distance between the merged school and new Adarsh Vidyalaya. Three schools do not fall under the RTE norms in terms of distance from the neighbourhood; one school (Government Primary School Khatiyon Ki Dhani) was located 3 km away from the newly merged Adarsh Vidyalaya. Two primary schools that were

Table 1.6  School profile before the mergers: 2013–2014 Enrolment in Merged School

Structure Teacher Name of Merged of Merged in Merged Total Distance from Primary School School School Boys Girls Enrolment New School* Kukas

Primary

4

27

44

71

Balayaon Ki Dhani Primary Rampura Dabdi Primary

3 5

17 58

10 67

27 125

Khatiyon Ki Dhani Nanakpura Chalabriyonki Dhani Ganesh Vihar Newata

Primary Primary Primary

2 3 2

10 25 11

9 20 13

19 45 24

Primary Primary

2 4

7 36

13 45

20 81

Within school campus 1.5 km Within school campus 3 to 4 km 1 km 3 km Within 1 km Within school campus

Source: U-DISE, 2013–2014 and Fieldwork, 2017. * Note: Information related to the distance from the merged schools to the new school was provided by the principal of the new school.

42  Aysha Malik merged into another school had the facility of Anganwadi when the school was closed in 2013–2014. One school located in the village of Rampura Dabdi was more than 3 km away from the newly created Adarsh Vidyalaya, with an Anganwadi after the merger. But the Anganwadi attached to the school was closed in 2015–2016. Similarly, another school in the village of Ajayrajpura with an Anganwadi centre was closed. Although the village size is small, with a population of 350, still no Anganwadi centre was found there.

Awareness of school merger policy among students and households To map out the implementation of the school merger policy, a household survey was carried out through questionnaires and interviews with students between the ages of 6 to 18 in the research study area. The questionnaire was limited to information about the implementation of the school merger policy and its effect on students. The information collected from these households was examined to map out the effects of the school merger policy on students, parents and households as a whole. One of the most important backdrops of this policy document was that the objective of the policy, the methodology adopted and the closures of schools were not known to the public. No public opinion was taken into consideration. People started showing their concerns after newspapers reported the merger of 14,000 schools. Now, around 62 per cent of households remain unaware of the school merger policy in the four selected villages. 15 per cent of households heard about the school merger policy only after the schools were closed, and 20 per cent only heard when the schools were relocated into new places as part of the merger. Only 1 per cent of the respondents learned of the school merger policy by different means. However, 64 per cent of the students did not face difficulties in the newly created Adarsh Vidyalaya; 6 per cent had difficulties reaching school, because of the distance from their home (Table 1.7). Female students were most affected under this policy, as they had to travel farther from their respective homes to the newly created schools. The school environment is an issue for children in newly created schools, because of cultural differences. Language is another issue faced by students in newly merged schools. The study found that 15 per cent of the students from closed schools joined low-fee private schools because of the long distance of the newly created school from their home, which is a burden for poor families. Most of the students who moved to private schools belonged to the monthly income of Rs 5,000 to Rs 10,000. However, when we look at the data village-wise, the highest percentage of children i.e. 25 per cent who moved to private schools were from Rampura Dabdi. The merging of schools in the villages increased more distance from home and caused hardship to students.

Problems of equity and access in education  43 Table 1.7  Percentage of students facing difficulties after the merger policy Village Name

More No SEC/ Move to Distance New School Difficulty, HSC School No Private of School Environment Especially Nearby Difficulties School for Girls Habitation

Kukas Rampura Dabdi Ajayrajpura Newata Total

0.0

0.0

6.7

13.3

0.0

80.0

9.1

0.0

27.3

36.4

0.0

27.3

8.3 6.7 5.7

0.0 6.7 1.9

0.0 0.0 7.5

8.3 6.7 15.1

0.0 20.0 5.7

83.3 60.0 64.2

Source: Fieldwork, 2017.

Conclusion The school merger policy has faced criticism, because it was implemented without considering the actual conditions of the schools. It was reported that around 4,000 schools were reopened in 2016–2017 (Scroll.in, 2017). Most schools of the closed during the merger were abandoned and are in shambles. The Rajasthan government has not yet decided whether to use such school spaces for other activities in the village. The schools that were merged or closed in the process of the merger have not followed the basic norms stated in the merger policy (an enrolment below 15 students at the primary level). Now, the school merger policy may be a good idea in terms of increasing enrolment in schools, but access to schools is being denied to students in remote areas because the policy does not include identifying schools and their socio-cultural importance. Schools establish social links in rural areas, where they also run other programmes. For example, Anganwadi centres, which provide basic health and nutrition facilities, were forced to close down because of the school merger policy. This raises many questions about restructuring the whole school education structure. If school complexes or composite schools have been created or established, as discussed in NEP 2020, does it reduce the limit to neighbourhood criteria at the primary and upper-primary levels, given the fundamental right of every child to reach school within a limited distance between schools and households? This is a consideration, because after the creation of an Adarsh Vidyalaya in every gram panchayat, there were only small schools which provided education up to the primary level. The school merger policy may be good for outcome-based approaches and provide high-quality education, but there is a need to understand the limitation of the villages to access schools in terms of female participation, the distance to school and the socio-cultural composition of the habitation. A lack of consultation with local people creates additional problems of

44  Aysha Malik accessibility. Further research could be carried out to understand the operational dynamics of the Right to Education Act and the neighbourhood criteria for establishing schools under the merger policy. Without assessing the impact of the merger policy, the quality of education cannot be explored. Studies need to be carried out to articulate the difficulties and barriers experienced by different stakeholders after the implementation of the school merger policy.

Notes 1 Centrally sponsored schemes to provide the minimum essential facility to primary schools. 2 A unique initiative launched in Rajasthan in 1987 with financial assistance from the Swedish International Development Agency, it seeks to reach out to children in remote rural areas where formal primary schools are either non-existent or dysfunctional. Local youth with some basic education (qualified Grade X in the case of men and lower in case of young women) are identified, trained and provided continuous educational support to teach children in Shiksha Karmi Day Schools, Parihar Patshalas and Angan Pathsalas. 3 Lok Jummbish (LJ), or the people’s movement, was initiated in 1989 in partnership with the Government of India, the Government of Rajasthan and the Swedish International Development Agency to ensure education for all in Rajasthan by the year 2000, through mobilization of the community. Lok Jumbish has a broad perspective on primary education, which is not limited only to primary school. The three major focal points of LJ, as underlined in the National Policy for Education in 1986, are: (i) universal access and enrolment, (ii) universal retention of children up to 14 years of age, and (iii) a substantial improvement in the quality of education to enable all children to achieve essential levels of learning. 4 Schools set up in un-served habitations (with no schooling facilities within one km) under the EGS & AIE scheme to provide education to out of school children. These centres are called Alternative Schools, with different names. EGS schools in the States of Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh; Maavadi in Andhra Pradesh; multigrade learning centres in Kerala; Shishu Shiksha Karamsuchi Kendras in West Bengal; contract schools in Maharashtra; Rajiv Gandhi Swarna Jayanti Pathshalas in Rajasthan. 5 The centrally sponsored scheme of District Primary Education Programme (DPEP) was launched in 1994 as a major initiative to revitalise the primary education system and to achieve the objective of the universalisation of primary education. 6 A centrally sponsored scheme for providing universal access to elementary education in 2001. 7 A habitation is a distinct cluster of houses existing in a compact and contiguous manner; with a local name; its population should not be less than 25 in plain areas and not less than 10 in hilly/desert/sparsely populated areas. In case there exits more than one such cluster of houses in a village, they will not be treated as separate habitations unless the convenient walking distance between them is more than 200 metres. 8 School district consolidation is the merging of two or more district jurisdictions into one; it has largely remade the local administration of American public education. The National Centre for Education Statistics (NCES) reports that in the 2008–2009 school year, there were 100,713 public schools in 13,976 school districts serving 49.3 million students. That compares to an estimated 271,000

Problems of equity and access in education  45 schools in nearly 130,000 school districts in 1920, serving 23.6 million students (Berry, 2004; Fischel, 2009). 9 In 2001, China implemented a policy called ‘A Decision Reform and Develop Primary School Education.’ This particular programme was to close down smaller schools in more remote areas and merge them into with larger ‘central schools’ (National Bureau of Statistics, 2006). The overall goal for this merger of schools in China was to enhance the quality of primary education and use scarce educational resources more economically and efficiently for all rural students. Nationwide, the number of primary schools in rural China has fallen by 24 per cent, from 416,000 in 2001 to 317,000 in 2005 (National Bureau of Statistics, 2006). 10 For details, see https://scroll.in/article/835687/cramped-classrooms-longcommutes-dropouts-the-impact-of-rajasthans-school-mergers. 11 Integrated Child Development Services is a government programme in India, which provides food, preschool education, primary healthcare, immunizations, health check-ups and referral services to children less than 6 years of age and their mothers. 12 The number of schools was calculated based on the total number of schools in the district before the process of school mergers and after the process of school mergers between the years from 2013–2014 to 2015–2016. 13 Schools created in the process of mergers having facilities for primary with upper primary, secondary and higher secondary levels are called ‘Adarsh Vidhalaya’ in the state of Rajasthan. All schooling facilities in terms of infrastructure, teachers, drinking water and toilet facilities, special girl’s toilet facilities and all related to the input indicators have been provided to these Adarsh Vidhalaya, and further, in the year of 2015–2016, Utkrisht Vidhalaya have been created to improve the quality of education. Adarsh Vidhalaya 9,631 in numbers have been established under this programme are being the mentored by these Utkrisht Vidhalaya. On the basis of the various educational parameters, every district is ranked by the District Collectors and ADPCs. The basic purpose of these efforts is to define the priorities for the improvement of that district, to promote interventions in education and to ensure the participation and involvement of all stakeholders in educational development, including the district-level administration (Rajasthan Council of Elementary Education, 2016–2017).

References Aggarwal, Y. (2000). Primary education in Delhi: How much do the children learn? Occasional Paper. New Delhi: National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA). Aggarwal, Y. P. (1997). Small schools: Issues in policy and planning. Occasional Paper New Delhi: National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration. Berry, C. (2004). School inflation: Did the 20th century growth in school size improve education? Education Next, 4(4), 56–62. Bray, M. (1987). Are small schools the answer? Cost effective strategies for rural school provision. London: Commonwealth Secretariat Publication. Centre for Collaborative Education. (2001). How Boston pilot schools use freedom over budget, staffing, and scheduling to meet student needs. Boston: Centre for Collaborative Education. Cotton, K. (1996). Affective and social benefits of small-scale schooling. Charleston,WV: ERIC Clearinghouse on Rural Education and Small Schools.

46  Aysha Malik Cotton, K. (2001). New small learning communities: Findings from recent literature. Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory. http://www3.scasd.org/small_ schools/nlsc.pdf Diwan, R. (2015). Small schools in rural India: ‘Exclusion’ and inequity in hierarchical school system. Journal of Policy Futures in Education, 13(2), 187–204. Educate Girls. (2011–2012). Educate girls annual report. Mumbai: Educate Girls Foundation. Fitzwater, C. O. (1953). Educational change in recognised school districts. Washington, DC: Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Office of Education. Fischel, A. W. (2009). Neither ‘Creatures of the State’ nor ‘Accidents of Geography’: The consolidation of American public school districts in the twentieth century. Hanover, TN: Dartmouth College Economics Department. Government of India. (2009). The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, No 35 of 2009, New Delhi: The Gazette of India. Government of India. (2017). Three year action agenda (2017–18 to 2019–20). New Delhi: NITI AYOG. Government of Rajasthan. (2015–2016), Elementary and secondary education report card: Where do we stand? Jaipur. Govinda, R. (1995). Status of primary education of the urban poor in India: An analytical review. Paris: UNESCO. Goyal, S. (2007). Learning achievements in India: A study of primary education in Orissa. Document of the World Bank, Human Development Unit, South Asia Unit. Howley, A., & Howley, C. (2006). Small schools and the pressure to consolidate in education. Policy Analysis Archives, 14(10). ISSN 1068-2341. Kindon, G. G. (2017). The private schooling phenominon in India: A review. IZA Discussion paper 10612. Institute of Labour Economics (IZA). Kingdom, G. (1996). Private schooling in India: Size, nature and equity effects. Economic and Political Weekly, 31(5), 3306–3314 Lee, E., & Smith, B. J. (1996). Collective responsibilty for learning and its effects on gains in achivement for early secondary school students. American Journal of Education, 104(2), 103–147. Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). (2010). The report of the committee on implementation of Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009 and the resultant revamp of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan. New Delhi: Government of India. Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). (2016). Report of the committee for evaluation of the new education policy. Chapter VI, (School education) (p. 64). New Delhi: Government of India. Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). (2017). Draft document on ‘Guidelines for rationalisation of small schools across states for better efficiency,’ New Delhi: Department of School Education and Literacy, Ministry of Human Resource Development. Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD). (2020). Draft document on ‘National Education Policy 2020.’ New Delhi: Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India. Naik, J. P. (1975). Equality quality and quantity: The elusive triangle of Indian education. New Delhi: Indian Institute of Education Pune.

Problems of equity and access in education  47 National Bureau of Statistics. (2006). China statistics yearbook. Beijing: China Statistics Press. National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). (1988). Operation Blackboard Essential Facilities at Primary Stage: Norms and Specifications. New Delhi: National Council of Educational Research and Training. National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). (2006). Seventh All India School Education Survey. New Delhi: National Council of Educational Research and Training. National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). (2014). National achievement survey (Cycle 3), Class III, achievements highlights. New Delhi: Education Survey Division, National Council of Educational Research and Training. National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT). (2016). Eighth All India School Education Survey. New Delhi: National Council of Educational Research and Training. Nelson, E. (1985). School consolidation. ERIC Digest Number 13. Eugene, OR: ERIC Clearinghouse on Educational Management. Office of the Registrar General and Census Commission. (2011). Census of India: Primary census abstract. New Delhi: Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Retrieved from: http://www.censusindia.gov.in. Panigrahi, C. S. (2014). Quality of elementary education in India’s rural areas: Results from Annual Status of Education Report (ASER). Journal of Social Change, 46(4), 544–559. Rajasthan Council of Elementary Education. (2012–2013). Annual report. Jaipur: Department of School Education, Government of Rajasthan. Rajasthan Council of Elementary Education. (2014–2015). Annual report. Jaipur: Department of School Education, Government of Rajasthan. Rahasthan Council of Elementary Education. (2015–2016). Annual report. Jaipur: Department of School Education, Government of Rajasthan. Rajasthan Council of Elementary Education. (2016–2017). Annual report. Jaipur: Department of School Education, Government of Rajasthan. Ramachandaran, V. (2003). Lok Jumbish–Rajasthan people’s movement for education for all: Case study commissioned by the World Bank. New Delhi: World Bank Group. Ramachandran, V., with Harsh Sethi. (2001). Shiksha Karmi Project of Rajasthan: An overall appraisal. New Education Division Document No. 7. Stockholm: Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency. Rao, S. S. (2016). School closures and merger, a multi-state study of policy and its impact on public education system Telangana, Odisha and Rajasthan. Haryana, India: Save the Children. Raywid, M. (1997). Small school: A reform that works. Educational Leadership, 55(4), 34–40. Raywid, M. (1999). Current literature on small schools. Charleston, WV: ERIC Clearinghouse on Rural Education and Small Schools. Scroll.in. (2017, 3 May). Cramped classrooms, long commutes, dropouts: How Rajasthan’s school mergers have hurt students. Retrieved 24 May 2018, from https://scroll.in/article/835687/cramped-classrooms-long-commutes-dropoutsthe-impact-of-rajasthans-school-mergers Tilak, J. B. G. (2011). What matters for outcomes in elementary education in India? Indian Journal of Development, 5(1), 29–59.

48  Aysha Malik U-DISE. (2013–2014). Flash statistics: Secondary education in India progress towards UEE. New Delhi: National University of Educational Planning and Administration. U-DISE. (2014–2015). Flash statistics: Secondary education in India progress towards UEE. New Delhi: National University of Educational Planning and Administration. U-DISE. (2015–2016). Flash statistics:, Secondary education in India progress towards Universalization. New Delhi: National University of Educational Planning and Administration. Velaskar, P. (2010). Quality and inequality in Indian education. Education Dialogue, 7(1), 59–93. Witt, K. (2011). Consolidation in the Henry Country public school system. Blacksburg, VA: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University; Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies. World Bank. (2018). Learning to realize education’s promise. World Development Report 2018. Washington, DC: International Bank for Reconstruction and Development. World Bank. (2019). The education crisis: Being in school is not the same as learning. Retrieved 3 September 2019, from: https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/ immersive-story/2019/01/22/pass-or-fail-how-can-the-world-do-its-homework. print Zaidi, S.M.I.A. (2012). A study of small primary schools in India: Analysis of school report cards of selected sistrict in four states. New Delhi: Department of Educational Planning, NUEPA.

2 Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion The case of a tribal community Lipika Das

This study explores educational inclusion among the Bonda tribe in the Malkangiri district in the state of Odisha. It investigates to what extent the multilingual education (MLE) programme navigates local communities to realise the idea of educational inclusiveness. A semi-ethnographic investigation was undertaken, to study how the community was represented through participation and local language/knowledge, as a new form of inclusive education being envisaged in the educational policies for tribal development. This particular educational programme is one of the ways through which tribal communities obtain opportunities to assert their social and cultural identities. For policymakers, education has increasingly become critical for the inclusive development and progress of the nation. Yet, many research studies and reports on tribal education have indicated that access and enrolment do not ensure retention. A lack of interest and parental motivation, the medium of instruction (i.e. state language), teacher absenteeism and attitudes, the opportunity cost of time spent in school (particularly for girls) and the large-scale seasonal migration of students are major setbacks for inclusive education programmes. With new approaches to education, changes are visible, particularly in the areas of access, pedagogic reforms and community participation in education in tribal regions. The concept of inclusive education is still new and aims to realise education for all, regardless of caste, gender, class or regional barriers. Since independence, India’s educational policies have emphasised the need for inclusive education. According to the Kothari Commission (1964–1966), one important social objective of education is to equalise opportunity, enabling the so-called venerable or underprivileged classes to use education as a means to improve their condition. The goal of inclusive education is to creatively respond to the diverse needs of all learners,by increasing participation in learning, cultures and communities, and reducing exclusion within and from education. The central argument for inclusive education is that we can all learn, we are all different, we all belong to and have a role in society, and differences can and should be valued. The commission underlined the significance of community living in schools. On this view, every educational institution should try to develop community participation, which in turn increases students’ confidence in their local culture and identity.

50  Lipika Das Similarly, the National Policy on Education (NPE), in 1968 and 1986, addressed the significance of learning regional languages. It outlined a ‘three language formula’ to be implemented in secondary education. Subsequently, the National Curriculum Framework (NCF, 2005) envisaged the representation of community knowledge in the curriculum to integrate cultural values and identity in education. Community knowledge and language were included in the curriculum framework to forecast inclusiveness in education. The National Education Policy (NEP) in the 2016 draft and the 2020 NEP also encouraged the policy for inclusive education for tribal communities, by providing students material incentives such as scholarships, residential campuses and study materials. MLE was a major programme among the many initiatives that envisaged an idea of educational inclusiveness for tribal communities. The concept of MLE was introduced by Robert Dunbar, a human rights lawyer at the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII). MLE is rooted in sociological, educational and legal perspectives which intend to educate indigenous/tribal and minority (ITM) children (including immigrant minorities) (Magga et al., 2004; Mohanty, 2009; Skuttnabb-Kangas, 2008). In 2009, the Government of Odisha Department of School and Mass Education passed a resolution for the Multilingual Education Programme. One objective under this programme was to adopt the local language and knowledge through community participation in selected tribal schools. Under this scheme, the first attempt was to provide continuous training to local teachers. The trained teachers would then help prepare curricula meant for educating tribal students. To make the curriculum locally relevant, the teachers were advised to adopt certain strategies to collect local knowledge from tribal habitations. Ensuring the participation of the members of the tribal community was a strategy for sharing community knowledge with teachers. Subsequently, with a series of consultative programmes and expert inputs, the teaching-learning materials were prepared and adopted. The logic underlying the curriculum was to ensure that it should be locally relevant, student-centric and participatory learning, with the active involvement of local people as its main stakeholders. The concept of inclusive education signifies education for all. The outline of the MLE action plans suggests that teachers from tribal communities will be engaged, and thematic approaches will be adopted for the preparation of curriculum and instructional materials. Primary schools will be arranged with at least five classes and at least 20 children in Class I, at least five classrooms and five teachers (with at least two mother-tongue teachers). With the agreement of village education committees, the mother tongue will be used as the medium of instruction. The community will provide support for the preparation of curricula and reading materials for their own children. Additional academic support at the international and national levels will also be incorporated into the entire process of planning and administration. The Odisha Primary Education Programme Authority undertook the programme in tribal districts. MLE brings about a cluster approach to tribal

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  51 education under the Srujan programme and transformative teacher training in tribal areas under the Survai programme. These two programmes were integrated,to bring about a pedagogical change in the schools of tribal areas. As mentioned earlier, community involvement is a prerequisite in MLE and the cluster approach to tribal education, in which child-friendly activities are designed to make learning more effective and meaningful. In addition, a teacher-training module called Rupantar was adopted for nontribal teachers, to change their approach towards educating tribal children (Mishra, 2009). The state of Odisha established the Bonda Development Agency (BDA) in 1977, to bring the Bonda into the mainstream; however, the response it has received from different segments has not been very encouraging (Mahapatra, 1982; Nanda, 1994; Roy, 1993). Because of structural problems, the educational status of the Bonda tribe continues to remain vulnerable. The village’s distinctive social life and self-sufficient economy have emerged as barriers to education. According to the 1961 census, the literacy of the Bonda community was 2.16 percent. In 1971, it declined to 1.42 percent, and in 1981, it increased to 3.61 percent. But until 1981, the female literacy rate was less than 1percent. In response, to pursue the goal of inclusive education for the Bonda tribe, the BDA took initiatives with the Bonda tribe through various means. Agricultural advancement, socialization, acculturation and educational transformation were taken into consideration for inclusive development. Through the government initiatives, tribal students began to enroll in the schools, as the first step for inclusive education (Government of Orissa, 1979). In 2009, with a well-thought-out plan, the MLE programme was commissioned in five selected Bonda schools in the Khairput block of the Malkangiri district. Decades after its implementation, the MLE was extended to 20 schools. Other than an official evaluation of this flagship programme, there has been no serious attempt to examine its overall effect on tribal communities. In this context, the present study becomes significant. It aims to explore the significance of the MLE programme for inclusive educational progress and the participation and contribution of Bonda community members in MLE school education. A semi-ethnographic method is employed, to account the everyday functioning of the schools in the tribal habitation. In addition to this, village panchayat (rural local governance ) members, parents of the students, MLE teachers and students were another source of information about their experiences of different stages of this scheme, as it wasimplemented. A content analysis of students’ textbooks from classes one to three showed whether the programme promotes educational inclusiveness and whether such initiatives establish a new relationship between community and school. Four MLE primary schools, namely Bondapada, Dumuripada, Andrahal and Podeiguda, were selected for the field study. Because of their distinct geographical locations and tribal identities, the sample schools were spread across three villages: Mudulipada, Dumuripada and Andrahal.

52  Lipika Das This study targeted students of Grade 1 to Grade Five in four sample MLE schools, because they all belonged to a Bonda linguistic community with no exposure to the mainstream Oriya language. Two MLE-trained teachers, two regular teachers, one teacher from the Aasha Kiran NGO and three Community MLE Workers (CMWs)1 were interviewed for this study. A local community leader, the head of the village, parents of students and village members were also interviewed. Though the field study collected both qualitative and quantitative data, this chapter focuses mainly on the qualitative aspect.

Dynamics of tribal education in Odisha The Constitution of India identified certain ethnic minority groups, which are traditionally known as tribes, or Scheduled Tribes (ST), who constitute 8 percent of the total population. There are 573 tribal groups distributed in different parts of the country. Most tribal communities have their own languages, which are different from the mainstream languages spoken in the state where they are located. There are more than 270 such languages. Tribal languages belong to all major language families in India, of which the Austic, Dravid, Tibetan-Chinese and Indo-European families are prominent. One feature of a tribe is that most members live in scattered houses located in interior, remote and inaccessible mountainous and forest areas of the country. About 22 per cent of tribes have fewer than 100 residents. More than 40 per cent of tribes have fewer than 300 to 500 people, while others have fewer than 500. Though tribes account for only 8 per cent of the Indian population, they constitute a majority in many states and union territories, which makes a large population in total. For instance, they make up a huge majority in Mizoram (94.75 per cent), Lakshadweep (93.15 per cent), Nagaland (87.70 per cent) and Meghalaya (85.53 per cent). However, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal constitute 83 per cent of the total tribal population, even though the non-tribal population constitutes a majority in these states. Earlier in its history, Odisha formed a part of larger empires under the two most important rulers of ancient India: Ashoka (third century BC) and Kharavela (first century B.C.) (Kulke, 1978). At present, the tribal communities in Odisha are among the poorest, most vulnerable and exploited groups. Most of them are restricted to mountainous and distant tribal hilly areas of Odisha. The tribes mostly inhabit the western mountainous regions of the state (Odisha), mainly in or close to forested areas. Out of the total tribal population in Odisha, 68.09 per cent live in scheduled areas and the remaining outside scheduled areas. They set up around 118 panchayat samities under the Tribal Sub-Plan Sector and 192 gram panchayats in 12 districts. Most of them are in five districts located in the most backward regions, such as Kalahandi, Balangiri and Koraput (KBK) (Directorate of Economics and Statistics, 2009–2010).

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  53 The Odisha tribal groups’ educational achievements are not impressive, even today. In 1971, the tribal literacy rate in Odisha was 9.46 per cent, and in 1981, it was 17.01 per cent. By 1992, it increased to 22.31 per cent. In 2001 it was 37.37 per cent. According to the Census of India, 2011, the overall literacy rate in Odisha was 72.87 per cent, whereas the tribal literacy rate was 52.24. The difference in overall literacy and tribal literacy is 20.53 per cent. The female literacy rate is 64.01 per cent, whereas the tribal female literacy rate is 41.20 per cent, a difference of 22.81 per cent. The growth of tribal literacy in the state has not progressed proportionately to that of the general population. In the study area, the total literacy rate of the Malkangiri district was 48.54 per cent, with the male literacy rate at 59.07 per cent and the female at 38.28 in 2011. The difference between the male and female literacy rates is 20.79 per cent. However, the total tribal literacy rate of the Malkangiri district is 35.23 per cent, of which the tribal male literacy rate is 44.91 per cent and the female rate is 26.25 per cent, according to the 2011 census (2011). The difference between the tribal male and female literacy rates is 18.66 per cent. Low levels of literacy and educational backwardness among tribal communities can be traced back to a lack of motivation for education, poor adequate academic infrastructure in the neighbourhood and the lack of a proper communication system. In this context, the reports of the Committee on Social Welfare and Welfare of Backward Classes, popularly known as the Renuka Ray Committee (1959), the Scheduled Areas and Scheduled Tribes Commission (1960–1961), the Education Commission (Kothari Commission) (1964–1965) and the Working Group on Tribal Development during the Sixth (Five Year) Plan (1980–1985) and Seventh (Five Year) Plan (1985–1990) are significant. These committees, commissions and working groups have recommended guidelines to impart education in the mother tongue at the primary level, avoid weight on enrolment, appoint teachers familiar with the local language, prepare textbooks in tribal languages for tribal children, declare school holidays as per local need and convert the local tribal institutions into schools. Suggestions include preparing a textbook based on the tribal lifeworld, incorporating agriculture and forestry-based education at the primary stage and creating intensive programs for parental education, such as adult education. Establishing ashram-type schools, emphasizing the informed aspects of education to learn how to deal with problems relating to land, credit, currency, weights and measures, hygiene and local geography and providing incentives such as scholarships, midday meals and uniforms are other suggestions. In spite of these recommendations, suggestions and action plans that were made from time to time, the modern educational system, skill-acquisition and learning did not substantially improve tribal life. Tribal knowledge, learning processes and education are mostly informal, oral and non-institutionalised. However, under the standard mode of education, tribal communities must acquaint themselves with formal, institutionalised, lettered forms of knowledge and educational systems. The gulf between what is

54  Lipika Das offered to the tribe in the name of education and the actual needs of the community has widened, resulting in high dropout rates and poor retention. Against this background, one questions the context of the educational rights of the tribes of Odisha. Unsurprisingly, the usual predicament of the literacy rate is still the focus of the educational system. As a result, the educational system in Odisha remains weak. According to the Odisha Child Census (OCC) 2005, conducted by the Odisha Primary Education Programme Authority (OPEPA), there are 11,479 schools with a total enrolment of 673,622 students, more than 20 per cent of whom belong to a linguistic minority. The report reveals that 3,421 schools in the tribal areas are monolingual, and 2,499 schools have more than 90 per cent tribal students enrolled. There is a substantial gap between the home language and school language at 5,919 schools with tribal children enrolled. Only 10 out of 100 tribal students matriculate. Given the complex problems associated with the backward status and cultural identity of tribal communities, the implication is that the modern education system excludes tribes from the rest of society. As a result, new forms and modes of education system have been proposed for the communities in the tribal regions of Odisha. In this context, the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT),with the cooperation of the Central Institute of Indian Languages and UNESCO, has carried out a wide range of discussions on MLE, with special emphasis on tribal children (UNESCO, 2005). These deliberations were useful for policymakers seeking to outline and recommend concrete action plans for tribal areas. Subsequently, in 2006, the state adopted the MLE programme as a multifaceted strategy to address the educational backwardness of tribal regions. The tribal advisory committee, headed by the chief minister of the state, provisionally declared the introduction of the tribal language as a medium of instruction, including Santali as a tribal language. The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) initiated an MLE programme in 10 languages for a period of five years on a pilot basis,based on the principles of the NCF 2005. The District Institute of Education and Training (DIET)2 faculties were deputed to extend academic support. Teachers and language resource staff were selected from 10 tribal communities and trained in MLE and the NCF 2005, and were then able to educate tribal children effectively.

The Bonda tribe and education The Bonda is a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) in the state of Odisha. In the hills of the Khairput Block of Malkangiri in southern Odisha, government records describe the Bonda Highlanders as ‘backward’ and ‘ex-criminal.’ They are also referred as Bondo, Bondo-Poraja, Bhonda, or Remo, terms that generally denote ‘human.’ A population of approximately 12,000 (2011 census) is dispersed in 23 main villages and several hamlets in the isolated hills (Mahapatra, 1982). As a linguistically

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  55 classified group, the Bonda community comes under the Austro-Asiatic Family (Furer-Haimendorf, 1994). Bonda is a tribal language related to the southern sub-group of the Munda branch of the Austrian language family. It is a spoken language,for which no traditional written system is registered. Bonda is a part of the Gotob-Remo branch of the Munda language family, sharing Gotob with another southern Munda language family (Mahapatra, 1982; Nanda, 1994; Roy, 1993). The social history of the Bonda traces their roots to the Bonds clan of the Bastar district of Chhattisgarh. According to a local tale, the tribe gained the name from Bondi Mahadei, who proclaimed in exile that her son was the legitimate heir to the kingdom of Bastar. The sword of the last king became the symbol of Bonda nationalism. While describing the Bonda culture, Elwin (1950) explains that this sword is a powerful symbol in the life of the tribal community. He states that ‘it has immense snob-value; it fortifies the tribe’s self-respect by establishing that fragile link with the Rajput nobility and it is the ambition of every aboriginal to maintain.’ The broad sociopolitical configuration of the kingdom, and the tribal hinterland circumscribing it, remained qualitatively unchanged until the beginning of the nineteenth century. The Tribal Commission (1962) report underlines that the Bonda community existed independently in the highlands as a single homogeneous entity. As a result, their cultural economy remained unique. The dormitory is the institution for socialization and the ways to bring matrimonial alliances. Marriage is by choice of patterns and involves a bride price, such as a pair of cattle. The most interesting factor is the custom of marrying 10- to 12-year-old boys to adult women aged from22 to 25 years old. The wife attains a12- to 13-year-old husband for the security of her old age. Polygamous marriage was sanctioned according to the tribe’s socio-economic status (Mahapatra, 1982; Nanda, 1994; Roy, 1993). Bonda religious beliefs are an amalgam of Hinduism with indigenous beliefs and practices which are more animalistic in nature, drawing from magic and sorcery. The religious technicians are the Pujari, the ‘Dissari’ who perform rituals during festivals, ceremonies and other rites to evade the effects of evil spirits; the ‘evil eye' cast on individuals is believed to cause most illnesses, diseases and loss of property. The Bondas are traditionally an agrarian community, but in a different mode of operation, with settled, terraced and shifting or ‘podu’ cultivation. The traditional Bonda economy was ‘not exactly self-sufficient but was certainly self-sustaining’ (Nanda, 1994:11). Obviously, for developmental thinkers, the transformation of tribal communities requires a twofold strategy: self-sustenance and self-sufficiency. The programme envisaged under the MLE had great scope in achieving these stated goals, and the radical changes in school education sought to bring a ray of hope to the community. In fact, one of the main objectives of the MLE program was to realise community participation in the educational process of tribal children.

56  Lipika Das

Community participation in education Studies indicate that the academic performance of students from different sociocultural backgrounds varies (Griffin & Steen, 2010). Those students whose parents get involved in their learning generally receive better academic results than their counterparts. The participation of parents and communities in education is proved to bring substantial benefits for improving education and learning outcomes (Epstein, 2006; Griffin & Steen, 2010; Klein & Ballantine, 1999; Rose, 2003; Sander, 2001; Sheldon, 2007). Shaeffer (1992) elaborates on community participation in education in terms of (a) the use of resources (such as a primary health care facility); (b) the contribution or extraction of resources (such as materials and labour); (c) attending meetings (such as parents’ meetings at school); (d) consultations on particular issues; (e) involvement in the delivery of services; (f) involvement in delegating powers; and (g) decision-making at every stage, i.e. the identification of problems, planning, implementation and evaluation. In the educational discourse, the community represents parents, community members and the elected representatives of local governing institutions. Direct political intervention is another crucial aspect of community participation. It is intended that the community have a political voice in terms of (a) supervising and monitoring teachers and teaching processes; (b) monitoring the use of resources and their deployment; (c) raising issues of larger educational change; and (d) influencing the curriculum and the way it is implemented (Singh & Mor, 2013: 3). We should acknowledge the fact that in India, community participation in education is not a new concept. In precolonial times, education was available to the masses through the pathshala (traditional village school) and madrasa (school for the Muslim community), which were managed and sustained with the generous support of the local people. All of the arrangements, including the requirement for teachers, building school spaces and other facilities for students, were made by the local communities. There used to be no central authority (like an education board) to design the curriculum, which was structured, though loosely, by the teachers and community people together (Singh & Mor, 2013: 4). According to Govinda (2003), community participation in education means the involvement of parents and community leaders. Parents are motivated to support the idea of community participation in the educational activities as they think that their contribution would improve in their own lives as well. As a policy, community participation takes different stages and forms in education. Mohan, Gayatri Dutt, and Antony (2003) classify four stages of community participation. The first stage consists of creating awareness among parents about the importance of sending their children to school regularly. The second stage is characterised by an increased awareness which, in turn, creates more demand for education. In the third stage, community support is sought and ensured, while framing the provisions for establishing and managing schools. Fourth, community participation

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  57 is sustained by establishing school management committees, which include members of the local community. The advantages of community participation in education are contemporary discourses among experts and policymakers. Moreover, community participation in the management of school education has been visualised as an important strategy in all policy initiatives at the national and global scales. There has been a worldwide discourse and sincere effort to make the desired improvements in education, in which the involvement of families and the community are brought to centre stage (UNESCO, 2003). In India, education policies also have suggested the significance of local involvement in improving the conditions of the schools in rural and underdeveloped regions of India. The first Education Commission of India, for instance, clearly spelled out the need to decentralise school education and involve local bodies in the processes related to school improvement. According to the commission, the immediate goal was to associate communities with the schools in their locality (Ministry of Education, 1966). Subsequently, in 1986, the National Policy on Education also reinforced direct community involvement in the form of Village Education Committees (VECs)3 for management and improvement in school education at the village level. Moreover, the Programme of Action (POA) 1992 and the seventy-third and seventy-fourth constitutional amendments further strengthened the VECs. It directed the entire state of India to lay down general guidelines on the constitution of VECs and establish norms of accountability with respect to the heads of these institutions. In pursuance of the POA, the VEC was formed under the structures for decentralised planning and management. The VECs have been entrusted with the responsibility to operationalise micro-planning and school mapping in the village through systematic house-to-house surveys and periodic discussions with parents. VECs were expected to build a congenial atmosphere through activities such as street plays, folksongs, rallies, etc. (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 1998). Furthermore, the Sarva Shikha Abhiyan (SSA)4 too highlighted the importance of the systematic mobilization of the community and the creation of an effective mechanism of decentralised decision-making. The National Curriculum Framework (2005) introduced a noble idea that parents and community members could serve as resource persons to share their knowledge and experiences about a particular topic being studied from the community perspective. This was supplemented with the Right to Education Act 2009, which recognised the role of local governance in the School Management Committee (SMC)5 in each school. Community participation has also been emphasised in the native language-based MLE, which has become a global movement for linguistic minorities (Mohanty, Panda, Phillipson, & Skutnabb-Kangas, 2009). This study broadly operationalises the concept of community participation to explore the different shades of community involvement in the state-sponsored MLE programmes implemented in the tribal habitations of Odisha.

58  Lipika Das

Fieldwork and method of data collection MLE was implemented in schools to establish effective links with the local language in the tribal habitation of Odisha. This study examined the mode of functioning of MLE schools, which involve its major stakeholders, such as students, teachers, parents and village members. The study deployed an ethnographic method to ascertain the integration of local culture in academic practices, both in curriculum and pedagogy. The ethnographic method is useful to study and track how knowledge is transacted from community knowledge into the world of educational knowledge. As an empirical tool, ethnographic research on classroom observation (Thapan, 2013) suggests that the participatory classroom observation enables researchers to reflect on the different processes and practices of learning. Several aspects of classroom instruction, such as reviews, presenting new material, conducting guided practice, providing feedback and correctives, and conducting independent practice, on the basis of daily, weekly and monthly reviews, have been found to be significantly related to students' academic involvement. A systematic classroom observation and accounting of such observations provides a credible and substantial knowledge base to help researchers contextualise the problems under study and interpret the context in light of the information gathered. In this study, classroom observations were conducted in Grade 1 to Grade 5 classrooms of MLE schools. The purpose of making classroom observations was to capture multiple facets that help realise students’ participation in the teaching and learning process. It involves many dynamics, such as language practices in the classroom, the availability and usage of textbooks, classroom conditions, different ways to link the local culture with classroom discussions, and the learning of the mother tongue. Classroom observations were supplemented with audio/video recordings and written field notes. Local tribal leaders helped the researcher to interpret and translate the Bonda language. Apart from classroom observations, semi-structured interviews were conducted among teachers, head teachers of the schools, parents, the heads of the villages, community MLE workers, the BRC and CRC of the MLE programme, and DPEP’s staff and MLE coordinator. All of the interviews were documented by audio/video recording. Field observations and interactions with many stakeholders reveal their general attitudes and approaches towards the MLE programme being implemented in the school. A content analysis of textbooks was sought, to assess the representation of local knowledge in curricular practices. Moreover, the study also relied on official documents and reports to explain the role of the state in education and its stake in implementing the MLE programme.

Findings and discussion Teaching in the mother tongue Studies have found that there is a language barrier for Bonda students because of their self-sustained economic practice and lack of interaction

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  59 with those outside of the community. As a result, the mainstream language, Odia, remains a stranger to them. Of the sample students in the selected schools under this study, only five could converse in Odia, as they come from educated families and their parents were employed in government services. When asked how students can perform well in education, an MLE teacher in the school stated that ‘students can do their best in education if they were taught in their mother tongue.’ It is further observed that being taught in the mother tongue, students could understand the teacher's classroom instruction well. It was evident that students could understand what teachers said, because their mother tongue was used as a medium of instruction. As a result, the communication was effective. When the MLE teacher was asked if students could understand his language, he replied, ‘We speak the same language. Students talk with me as they talk to their parents at home.’ When I asked students about their understanding and comprehension of classroom teaching, they replied, It is understandable because, these stories and poems were known to us from our childhood, our parents, grandparents, elder siblings used to recite to us from our early days. We are familiar with some ideas about the village festivals and feasts. Similarly, we are familiar with folk dance, ancestor worship, brotherhood, unity etc. as our parents always encourage us to participate in village/community related activities. There are many concepts, topics in Environment books we feel familiarities because we spend lots of time with our parents in agricultural land, forest and hills. Our parents and elder siblings talk about weather, climate and nature. When we see those things in the textbook, we feel contained, confident and connected. Some students who were previously studying in Odia-medium schools shared their experience that they could not understand much. But after joining MLE schools, they could grasp and connect to day-to-day life. The teacher narrated a story from one of the folk tales of the community, which is part of the textbook. The name of the story was ‘Jungle Feast,’ and it narrates an event in which all the animals of the forest had food together and celebrated together. These stories were shared by the community members. After narrating the story, the teacher asked questions, and the students began to respond. In the mathematics class, students collected stones, sticks and fruit and vegetables eeds for calculations. This helped them to connect their practical knowledge and grasp the concepts. When I asked the Community MLE worker (CMW) about the students’ understanding and interaction with him, he said ‘children called me brother and they all are familiar to me, we are neighbours, they feel comfortable with me, they talk to me as they talk to their elder siblings and inactivities like folkdance, folkgame, folksongs they participate well with me as they are at home.’ Students’ interest and participation in school activities indicated that they enjoyed learning in the schools and gained conceptual understanding.

60  Lipika Das Assimilation of culture and school curriculum In general, in Odia-medium schools in the Malkangiri district, textbooks were in the Odia language, and the contents of the textbooks were meant for all the students of Odisha. There was no place for Bonda folklore or folk songs in these Odia textbooks. The stories and poems in the textbooks represented the dominant Odia culture. In the mathematics books, there was no reference to the Bonda number system, which is totally distinct from the common form of the mathematical number system. The textbooks designed and prepared for the MLE schools were different from the mainstream textbooks. They were created by a group of researchers, with the cooperation of members of the Bonda community who were invited by DPEP to prepare the textbooks. During the course of preparing the textbooks, elderly persons of the village were consulted to incorporate aspects of local culture into the curriculum. These include community values, norms and local knowledge.The content of the textbook included alphabets, numbers, words, stories and core Bonda community values. More than 23 textbooks on basic numbers, calculations, tables on mathematics, literature, grammar and environmental moral stories were prepared under the MLE programme. The textbooks were meant for students from the first to the fifth grades. The academic year was divided into 30 weeks, based on 30 academic themes, and each theme was supposed to be completed in each week. The theme-based learning for a week-long exploration enabled students to work together and learn together using locally available artefacts. A mathematics book was being prepared for Grade 1 and Grade 2. Though the pictures used in the books seemed to represent the Bonda community, the overall structure of the book suggested an Odia textbook. It looked like a translated version of an Odia mathematics textbook. The teaching materials used in the classrooms, however, referred to the Bonda culture. For example, to teach the mathematical concept of multiplication, seeds and stones were used. Thus, the Bonda culture was brought into the academic curriculum. In the MLE mathematics classes, CMWs taught the concepts of base value and unit system. For instance, during classroom teaching, the CMWs showed the students a number of small sticks and then asked the students to count those sticks with them. When they all reached 12, the CMWs asked the students, ‘How many sticks have we counted?’ The students replied in their mother tongue. Similarly, the mother tongue was used to count other items, such as fruits and vegetables. The materials used for the learning activities were made by students and CMWs in MLE schools. For example, in the activity of a mock weekly market in MLE schools, the scale used to weigh vegetables was made by students, with the help of locally available materials, such as coconut shells, a stick and ropes. Though the teachers belong the Bonda community, they were not from the same villages as the students. One of the teachers at the MLE School was asked whether he knew the parents of the students and whether he visits students’ home. He replied that he used to visit and stated

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  61 that ‘the village is very small and everybody knows each other. As a school teacher in the village, I get special treatment and I often visit the students’ place. The parents are curious to know whether they children are doing well in their studies.’ By organising regular cultural activities, the CMWs tried to link everyday knowledge with the world view of the community. The students’ knowledge system was built around loosely connected everyday concepts rooted in their everyday practices. For example, mathematical concepts and ideas were embedded in various cultural practices: agriculture, house construction, folk games, etc. The CMWs worked on these already developed informal knowledge systems, to transform and relate it to community knowledge by manipulating the activities, such as the buying-selling game, the mock marketplace game, etc. The use of the Bonda culture in the classroom was organised only through teaching materials. However, the mere use of seeds and stones as teaching materials hardly creates an effective link between the home culture and the school culture. The Bonda culture is rooted in the value and ethics of community that has continued since prehistoric times. Yet, the indigenous knowledge systems about agricultural, ecological and socio-religious practices have rarely been represented in classroom discussions. Students’ participation in classroom activities Observations of the students’ participation in classroom activities provide a sense of the effectiveness of the teaching practices. Conducting participant observations in the classroom shows whether the students have an interest in their studies. Teaching in the mother tongue enabled them to understand the classroom proceedings. Hence, they participated actively in classroom activities. When the teacher sang a song at the beginning of the class, everyone followed, without much difficulty. Students could answer questions about different characters of the stories the teacher told. When a teacher who was the resource person for the MLE programme was asked about what could be done to enhance students’ participation, he replied, ‘We have a number of folk songs and folklore. If we introduce them through narratives, then we can ensure students’ participation in the classroom.’ He further added, ‘But I am not being able to give them enough time as I have to look after higher grade students also.’ During the classroom observation, it was noticed that the students were asked to collect seeds and stones from outside, and the same were used for developing concepts and explanations thereafter. The students spontaneously participated in classroom activities. They also narrated stories and folklore, sang folk songs and did dances which were part of the Bonda folk culture. Apart from this, they were engaged in the art corner (discussed later in this chapter) by sketching in colour books. The classroom walls were found full of colour paintings made by students, with the help of CMWs. When I asked the MLE teacher about the enrolment and retention of students at the MLE School for the last five years, he

62  Lipika Das responded, ‘Before the MLE programme started, students hardly come to school regularly. Even if some turned up, they never opened their mouth in the classroom. They hardly spoke in the classroom. They used to stare at me helplessly and hopelessly when I was teaching in Odia language.’ He further added, ‘It is only recently after the implementation of MLE programme, students began to show interest and participate in the classroom interactions.’ Study materials used in the classroom activities were prepared by the students, with the help of CMWs. They showed the involvement and interest of the students in classroom practice. Students were also observed actively participating in planned activities, such as the buying-selling game, mock market and mock hospital. Classroom teaching practices Since the medium of instruction was the Bonda language, the interaction between students and teachers began to be effective. The whole teaching practice was a two-way process, and the classroom looked active and lively, because all of the students were responding to the teacher. However, teaching practices varied drastically from one MLE school to another. In some schools, the teachers were found to be very active, and everyday, the teacher started his class with a song related to a particular issue identified under the theme of the week. His teaching style was structured and well planned. However, in other MLE schools, the teachers were not equally enthusiastic. They followed the traditional learning methods of a non-participatory teaching style. Classroom teaching was limited to reading the textbook aloud and instructing students to repeat the same. However, there is no dearth of teachers in MLE Schools. Local NGOs have supported this programme by providing extra teachers in the schools. CMWs do most of the teaching work in the classroom. Actually, CMWs were appointed not to teach in the classroom, but MLE teachers have given all the teaching responsibility to CMWs. This was done because the MLE teachers turned their attention towards the students of higher grades. Therefore, in all four of the MLE schools, it was observed that CMWs were teaching classes regularly. However, their primary task is to strengthen newly learned concepts after the completion of school hours, through various activities, folksongs, folklore, games, etc. But in reality, CMWs had to manage both the teaching in the classroom and the supporting activities after the school hours. Since the CMWs could give their full time to the Grade 1 and Grade 2 students, there was no interruption to the regular classroom teaching process. In all of the MLE schools, Grade 1 and Grade 2 students used to sit together in classrooms. However, technically, CMWs were not trained to teach in the multigrade system. Classroom settings and infrastructure In the MLE school, classrooms and school buildings were well furnished, as separate funding was earmarked for this purpose. But the teachers said that

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  63 there were not adequate teaching aids to support instruction. Many technical and contextual mistakes were identified in the textbooks, after feedback and evaluation. During the course of teaching, the MLE coordinator of the school would identify mistakes in the textbook. Accordingly, feedback was given to the research team, to rectify mistakes and subsequently conduct follow-up activities. As discussed earlier, the MLE teachers mostly focused on teaching classes in the higher grades, and CMWs teach Grade 1 and Grade 2. The MLE teacher admitted that they were not able to give enough time to Grade 1 and 2 students. If the teachers are on leave, as usually happens elsewhere, regular teaching suffers. The MLE schools have received additional funds from the state, to improve the classroom condition and develop teaching materials. But they looked empty, with one table and chair in one of the MLE schools, which was observed during all my visits to that school. Most of the time, the school was found closed. The day I visited the school, the headmaster came at noon and was not yet aware that the MLE programme was being implemented in his school. Through my informal interaction with some of the teachers in this school, it was revealed that the Block Resource Coordinator (BRC)6 who was supposed to closely monitor and supervise MLE programmes in the block level hardly visited the MLE schools. On being asked why infrastructure in the classes was inadequate despite funds being allotted, one of the MLE teachers responded, ‘It is very difficult to travel to long distance in the hilly areas to procure materials.’ The poor condition of road connectivity between the villages and nearby towns makes travelling costs expensive, to bring materials to the school. Though there are enough funds for the school, a lack of connectivity and transportation results in great expense to get equipment to the school premises. Since the region is disturbed by the Naxal insurgence, the regular functioning of the school has been affected, and the security of the students is at high risk. Besides this, the MLE school building infrastructure looks attractive, and classrooms are properly organised. Classroom walls are filled with colour paintings prepared by the students. The four corners of the classroom have been named science, math, language and art corners. In the science corner, different types of soils, seeds, replicas of agricultural instruments and magnifying glasses were kept. In the mathematics corner, geometrical shapes made of clay or wood, handmade abacus instruments, handmade weighing scales, seeds and stones for counting, a measuring scale and a measuring tape were found. In the language corner, lots of flash cards with pictures and words on them, a handmade Bonda alphabet chart, storybooks, pens, paper, etc. were placed. In the art corner, drawing sheets, colour pencils, crayons, colouring books and lots of paintings done by the students were kept. Like the four corners, the four walls were also dedicated to science, mathematics, language and art. On the science wall were charts of body parts in the Bonda language. On the mathematics wall, the Bonda number system, a counting chart and pictures of geometrical shapes were fixed. Similarly, on language wall, a handmade Bonda word chart, a Bonda alphabet chart and a Bonda story written on paper with pictures were placed. On the

64  Lipika Das art wall, lots of colour paintings made by the students were seen. The lower half of the all the four walls had a rope tied on it, and colour storybooks were hung on these ropes. The decorated walls and corners motivate students to interact, participate in the pedagogical activities and express themselves. Moreover, each student was instructed to keep their own learning aids such as notebook, pen, pencils, eraser and sharpener. During my fieldwork, I observed that students were exploring all of the corners. When encountering problems during classroom teaching, students frequently referred to the word chart, alphabet chart and number chart. In MLE schools, the CMWs monitor students’ progress and maintain a record for each student. The CMWs used to pay visits to the home of all of the students and meet parents once a month. The parents were made aware of their students’ academic progress. If students could not attend the school, CMWs were asked to visit the home to find out the reason for the absence. Administrative support to integrate community and school The MLE programme has outlined certain innovative strategies to create a synergy between the community and the school. In this regard, programmes like srujana and suravi were initiated by the administration to bring the community close to the school. The MLE programme in Odisha has introduced an innovative approach called srujana, which means creativity. This programme is described as a: child-friendly programme built on school-community partnership. Srujana is the result of a cluster approach to education where the community has an important role in creating a learning atmosphere in schools. Teachers are facilitators and allow the community and the students to has taken part in child-friendly activities like story-telling festival, art and craft, traditional games, music and dance, nature study and village project etc. The purpose of the programme is to incorporate community knowledge into the school curriculum. Community resource centres have also been opened where members of the community share local knowledge with their students. (Mishra, 2009: 3) During the field study, the Srujan programme in the Malkangiri district was underway; it has been conducted every year. The DPEP at the district, block and cluster levels are the major collaborators in this programme, with MLE teachers. Special activities were designed and implemented at schools, not only to encourage but also to energise students and their parents. It helps in eliminating the gaps between the mother tongue and the state language. Activities organised under this programme were a storytelling festival, forest festival, art and craft exhibition, folklore festival, village project, literary activities, music, song and dance, quiz, learning camp, traditional game, science as fun and math mela (festival).

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  65 Another programme, called Suravi, was aimed at exploring the students’ skills and talents. This was an opportunity to provide the students a platform where they could participate and compete. The programme was organised at different stages; those who performed well at the school level were taken to the cluster level, then to the block, district and, finally, state levels. In 2017, the block-level students’ Suravi programme was celebrated in the Malkangiri district. Before the commencement of this annual event, a preparatory meeting was held. It was decided that the programme would be organised in every cluster, which includes blocks at the district level. The Cluster Resource Centres (CRCs)7 and Head Masters (HMs) of the concerned schools were given the responsibility to select the students from their respective schools and clusters. The selected students were persuaded to show their potential, skills and competencies in different activities, such as debating, quizzing, painting, creative writing, singing and so on. Students with special needs were given similar importance in the selection process. Following the guidelines, students from all seven blocks were selected to participate at the district-level Suravi. A total of 105 students were selected to participate in the events at the district level, comprised of different activities prescribed for 2018. At the state level Suravi, a selected number of students (68) from the district participated. The closing date of the event was on the eve of Students’ Day. The students from the district displayed their talent by participating in different competitions. Swachhata Pakhya is another programme designed to create awareness among students on the proper use of sanitation facilities, good hygienic behavior, etc., and to provide a healthy and clean school and village environment. All MLE schools are covered under this programme. Parental Counseling/Shiksha Mahasabha was organised for creating awareness among parents at the village level. Village meetings were held with parents at the block levels, to create awareness about education; parental counseling is one of the frontline activities for generating awareness among parents about the importance of education, with a special focus on the Right to Education (RTE) Act 2009. The aim is to sensitise the community, which in turn helps to increase enrolment and retention in the schools, which ultimately acts as one of the most important factors ensuring the quality of education. To sensitise the community on the significance of education, street plays were organised. This turned out to be communicative, interactive and useful across all generations. When some of the parents were asked what they thought about education, and why they were coming to such meetings, it summarises that, We want to come out of this village and want a better life. Our children will work in a government office, earn handsome income, and will have a better standard of living. They will be like these ‘Babus’ (government officers) and only through education and schooling, it can be achieved. We have lots of hope from here. Government is doing this for our children for the betterment of their life. From our village many children

66  Lipika Das went ahead to study elsewhere and stay in the hostel. Some are studying in Navodaya and some in the Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology (KIIT) Bhubaneswar. In the hostel, they are studying well and also getting jobs after completing their studies. The school will help to realise our dreams that is why we come to attend such meetings.

Conclusion The MLE programme being implemented still needs improvement in critical areas. It needs to be more conscious of taking into account culture and community. The students of MLE classes appeared to be happy and confident, because the classroom transactions were made through their mother tongue. The textbooks, activity charts and storylines were transacted through the local language. But in reality, a monolingual teaching method was practised in the schools, which was considered an easy method for the teacher. The local culture increasingly becomes a ritual, its usage restricted to the level of language in the textbooks and standard teaching materials. Instead of using one language, teachers should ideally encourage students to learn other languages, as well. In the MLE schools, students begin their education in the Bonda language, so they face no problems in understanding the teacher's language: the medium of instruction. The teachers are trained to teach in Bonda in the class. However, observation indicates that the MLE teachers’ lack of conceptual clarity with reference to MLE theory and practice has an adverse effect on the classroom teaching process. There also exists the problem of teaching the Odia and English languages. Students in Grade 4 and 5 are unable to speak Odia and English. They only speak the Bonda language. This poses a challenge to their future education, especially when they are upgraded into higher standards. They may encounter problems acquiring other languages in the later stages. Though this programme was initiated to propagate MLE, it appears to be ‘only one language programme.’ Teachers need to be aware about the limitation of the implemented programme and its actual effect upon students belonging to tribal communities. Moreover, motivation is needed to teach students in other languages, such as Odia and English, when they upgrade to higher standards.

Notes 1 A Community MLE Worker (CMW) was assigned to monitor the children's progress, organise village-level community activities, such as maintaining and running a library in the community, and hold periodic meetings and reading sessions in the villages. 2 A Village Education Committee (VEC) is formed to achieve the objective of the universalisation of elementary education. The committee for schools will be formed under Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, and the aim of the formation of the committee is to encourage a government-community partnership. The constitution of VECs will give community ownership to educational institutions, as it

Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  67 functions as a part of the social system. The committee will play a significant role in micro-planning, preparing school development plan including requirement of buildings, toilet and drinking water facilities. This step will bring a change in people’s attitudes towards education and will also help in motivating parents or guardians to send their children to schools, especially girls and children from disadvantaged groups. The VECs will also look forward the work of school construction and maintenance, school mapping and micro-planning exercises, the preparation of village education plans and monitoring school management, as well as teacher performance. The committee will also work towards the assurance of cent per cent completion of elementary education of all children, monitor the academic performance of children, attendance and the quality of education, alternative and innovative education centers as per the guidelines and directions of the District Education Committee. 3 Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) is the Union of India's flagship programme for achievement of Universalization of Elementary Education (UEE) in a time-bound manner, as mandated by the 86th amendment to the Constitution of India, making free and compulsory education to the children 6–14 years of age a fundamental right. It started in 2000–2001. 4 A School Management Committee (SMC) is held with the task of managing the school satisfactorily and promoting the education of all pupils in the village in order to comply with the Education Ordinance. The Ordinance stipulates that all members of the SMC shall be registered as managers of the school. 5 A Block Resource Centre (BRC) is a block-level institution that carries out the academic activities related to primary education. It regularly conducts in-service teacher training and provides academic support to teachers and schools on a regular basis, as well as to helping in community mobilisation. 6 A Cluster Resource Centre (CRC) works the same as the BRC at the cluster level. 7 A District Institute for Education and Training (DIET) is a district-level educational institute to help coordinate and implement state policies at the district level.

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Multilingual Education (MLE) for inclusion  69 Mohanty, A. K. (2009). Multilingualism of the unequals and predicaments of education in India: Mother tongue or other tongue? In O. Gracia, T. Skuttnabb-Kangas, & M. E. Torres-Guzman (Eds.), Imagining multilingual schools: Language in education and glocalization (pp. 262–283), Clevedon: Multilingual Matters. Mohanty, A., Panda, M., Phillipson, R., & Skutnabb-Kangas, T. (Eds.). (2009). Multilingual education for social justice: Globalising the local. Delhi: Orient Blackswan. Nanda, B. (1994). Contours of continuity and change: The story of the Bonda highlanders. New Delhi: Sage Publications. National Commission for Scheduled Tribes. (1962). Report of the scheduled areas and Scheduled Tribes commission 1960–61. Vol. 1. New Delhi: Government of India. National Council of Educational and Research and Training. (2005). National curriculum framework for school education. New Delhi: NCERT. National Education Commission. (1966). Report of the Education Commission 1964–66. New Delhi: Ministry of Education. National Policy on Education 1968. (1970). Report of the Education Commission. New Delhi: NCERT. Rose, P. (2003). Community participation in school policy and practice in Malawi: Balancing local knowledge, national policies and international agency priorities. Compare: A Journal of Comparative and International Education, 33(1), 47–64. doi:10.1080/03057920302597 Roy, P. (1993). Adibhumi. Odisha: Adya Prakashini, Cuttack. Sander, M. G. (2001). The role of community in comprehensive school, family, and community partnership programs. The Elementary School Journal, 102(1), 19–34. Schedule Areas and Schedule Tribes Commission. (1960–1961). Report on the Scheduled Areas and Scheduled Tribe Commission. Vol. 1. New Delhi: Government of India. Shaeffer, S. (1992). Collaborating for educational change: The role of parents and the community in school improvement. International Journal of Educational Development, 12(4), 277–295. doi: 10.1016/0738-0593(92)90004-6 Sheldon, S. B. (2007). Improving student attendance with school, family, and community partnerships. The Journal of Educational Research, 100(5), 267–275. Singh, D. P., & Mor, R. (2013). Community participation in school education.New Delhi: Shipra Publication. Skuttnabb-Kangas, T. (2008). Linguistic genocide in education – or worldwide diversity and human rights. Delhi: Orient Longman. Thapan, M. (2013). Ethnographies of schooling in contemporary India. New Delhi: Sage Publication Pvt. Ltd. UNESCO. (2003). Education in a multilingual world, position paper. Paris: UNESCO. UNESCO. (2005). First language first: community based literacy programmes for minority language contexts in Asia. Paris: UNESCO.

Part II

Women and minorities in higher education

3 Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system? A case study of a women’s university in Rajasthan Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram Education, besides being a process of learning, relearning and unlearning, serves as a systematic method for manifesting latent inner potentials. Education plays an important role in a person’s overall growth. However, the question arises whether education primarily serves these purposes or whether it becomes, instead, an instrument to perpetuate an asymmetrical structure, especially when we view women’s education in Indian context. This chapter examines this hypothesis, with particular reference to a private modern single-sex higher educational institution.1 The university chosen for study is in Rajasthan, which is a stronghold of highly traditional and patriarchal values. Rajasthan also has the highest number of private women’s universities in India. This apparent contradiction between the high number of single-sex women’s universities and the worrisome gender index compels us to investigate. It is pertinent to examine the case of private education in India, through mapping its socio-historical trajectories. Going back as far as 1813 shows that education was a subject upon which the state had begun to deliberate but was reluctant to act. Therefore, after considerable deliberation, the government left educational efforts to Christian missionaries (Adams & Dennis, 1971). Given the state’s position, terming education ‘public’ seemed unreasonable. Nevertheless, the seemingly private nature of education in the colonial era cannot be equated with the private nature of education in contemporary India, because missionaries and the empire did not address the need for education for profit, even though it was in line with their political economy. The British ‘policy of downward filtration’ is another historical point of reference about Indian education, evident in the Charter Act of 1835. Thomas Babington Macaulay proposed ‘downward filtration,’ which aimed to educate the top layer of society with the illusory hope that the benefit of education by a small privileged section would percolate down to the rest (Acharya, 1995: 670). In this case, the legislative body was public, whereas the executive agencies were religious organisations, which cannot be considered public. In this sense, the state’s philosophy was that of private education, which tended to be exclusionary, even though the missionaries later included the masses within their education services. The exclusionary nature of education in this early phase was due to inadequate funding

74  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram and, also, because the state targeted the upper caste and class. Education was thus private in the early phases, until it was made more democratic by James Ramsay, Marquess and Earl of Dalhousie and the first Governor General of India, who made a serious attempt to widen the scope of access to education by emphasising vernacular education (Das, 1957). Education for girls began to be conspicuous from the late 1840s, with the establishment of a few girls’ schools and colleges across the country. In this regard, the Bethune School (1849) in Bengal, the Alexander Native Girl English Institution (1863) in Bombay and the Poona Native Girls’ High School (1884) were remarkable initiatives. Female participation was very low, even though no fees were charged (Chakraborty, 2009). Das’s (1957) insightful work on Lord Dalhousie sheds light on this aspect of private and female single sex education, albeit without using such phraseology. Later, other academic spaces exclusively for women were carved out, such as SNDT Women’s University (Shreemati Nathibai Damodar Thackersey), established in 1916 by Maharshi Dhondo Keshav Karve. This was a noteworthy development in the field of single-sex education at the higher level, because it was meant for women regardless of caste, class or region. In this direction, many women’s colleges were established in affiliation with public universities. After independence, India tried to maintain truly public education, by virtue of its affordability. Its public nature, however, remained a nominal reality, due to the inadequate presence of educational institutions. During the colonial and even the post-colonial periods, until the 1980s, philanthropic contributions by industrialists played an important role in the growth of education, even though they funded private educational institutions. SNDT in Bombay and Banasthali Vidhyapith in Rajasthan are examples of private but philanthropic institutions. Since the 1990s, however, there has been a marked transition in motivation from philanthropy to profit making. India has experienced a rise in the number of private educational institutions, because of the government’s gradual withdrawal from the social sector, including education, which has paved the way for private investors to take over. The beginning of liberalisation accounted for a colossal shift in the national educational policy. The incentive to make profit, rather than impart education, has come to define what private education is in India (Pannikar, 2011; Tilak, 2014). The private nature of an educational institution is determined by its private ownership, self-financing and profit making. The overall trajectory of education in India, from the colonial period to the current day, has transitioned from a missionary institution, to missionary cum philanthropy, to public cum philanthropy, to profit-oriented private. Since education is now a private good rather than a public good, because of commercialisation, the present situation implies that education is for those who can afford to pay for it ,which departs from the public nature of education. Having dealt with the transition from public to private, it is pertinent to note here that Rajasthan has the highest number of private universities in India (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2019). In this context,

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  75 it becomes relevant to understand the role of private higher education institutions in this state. The presence of a large number of universities in Rajasthan certainly points towards its progressiveness. A historical study by Shyam Lal (1991) discusses the status of education in Rajasthan during the nineteenth century and draws attention to the rich tradition of philanthropists’ generous contributions towards education, albeit that education was an instrument for the perpetuation of traditions. The latest statistical figures pertaining to education in Rajasthan present a very robust picture (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2019). Of the 16 women’s universities in India, Rajasthan alone has three, which account for more than 18 per cent of the total number. There are, in fact, four women’s universities, namely Banasthali Vidyapith University (Tonk), Mody University of Science and Technology (Sikar), IIS University (Jaipur) and Jayoti Vidyapeeth University (Jaipur), which account for 25 per cent of the total of women’s universities in India. This may appear to be a promising development. Juxtaposing this information with the historical credentials of Rajasthan, which had and still has a strong bias against women and girls, suggests progress. However, a deeper analysis and enquiry could unravel the underlying realities. First, the question arises as to why there is a strong emphasis on single-sex women’s universities. Is it because there is demand for them? Since all of these universities are private, they operate based on market principles, that is, demand. Seeking answers as to why, in Rajasthan, parents prefer sending their girls to single-sex women’s universities, instead of co-educational universities or colleges, brings us closer to a reality which is not very different from Lal’s (1991) findings about the nineteenth-century outlook, viz., the perpetuation of tradition. Deploying the trope of modernity by private single-sex women’s universities is thus more a strategy to sustain tradition rather than challenge it. The national government’s retreat from public institutions has left a void to be filled by private organisations, whose primary concern remains the recovery of their investment, with considerable gains therefrom. When the responsibility for education is allowed to rest with private corporate bodies, primary concerns become of secondary order, as private organisations remain concerned with profit making rather than emancipatory education. Although private corporate academic institutions are enjoined to adhere to the guidelines of the University Grant Commission a national regulatory body for higher education in India, this adherence involves mere pursuance of the syllabi and documentary works. Understanding the repercussions of this is important, especially when a large number of students are lured into this trap and churned out as ‘uncritical and non-reflexive techno minds’ (Pathak, 2017: 277). A critical mind is necessary for understanding human dynamics (Pathak, 2017). Among many issues, functionalist education needs to be problematised, because such an approach allows the perpetuation of obscurantist age-old social systems. Emancipation, the core element of education, is the process of freeing subjects from unreasonable controls, to enjoy equitable freedom. The

76  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram most important part of the strategies to emancipate women is to provide them with the knowledge, skill and self-confidence necessary to participate meaningfully in social life. One issue concerns the contrarian relationship between students’ aspirations and parents’ intentions. The students’ failure to negotiate with their parents, whose traditional and patriarchal views contrast with the students’ desires, came to the notice of researchers. Emancipation is not a fixed and permanent category, in that it requires daily negotiation. For this reason, education cannot claim to be emancipatory unless it sticks to a dialogic platform, where unhesitating curiosity and dissent take place alongside intense discussions. Experiencing emancipation in a larger sense is contingent upon knowledge, understanding, exposure and sound acquaintance with pragmatic concerns, that is, jobs in an industrial or service society. Mazumdar (1987) holds that education is an essential instrument for women's equality and liberation. Realising the important role which education could have played, the early women’s movement during the 1920s and 1930s also demanded education for women. In the contemporary past, the National Policy on Education (1986) emphasised the promotion of women’s education in all areas of learning, to eliminate any sex-based stereotyping by guaranteeing women equality before the law. The latest AISHE (2018–2019) report assigns a total enrolment rate of 48.6 per cent for women in higher education in India (MHRD, 2019). This includes both public as well as privately owned institutions of higher education. It is important to underline the fact that Indian surveys prioritise ‘enrolment rate’ as the parameter of participation, as well as change. However, enrolment-centric information cannot provide a holistic picture, because it tends to overlook multiple micro trends which are crucial to understand the reality2 (Kalpagam, 2014). Although a 48 per cent enrolment rate is quite heartening, yet, several worrisome narratives emerge when we look at the micro trends. Even though the ambience created in modern private higher educational institutions presents a remarkable amalgamation of both traditional and modern values, private universities use such ambience as bait. The underlying scenario comes to surface upon investigation, which uncovers the work culture, pedagogy and infrastructure developed for educating women. It is here that the question crops up whether such private institutions are emancipatory or enchaining. A subsequent subset of hypotheses examines how and why the private modern educational institution remains a custodian of traditional values. The challenge is that they stand to lose business if they actually adhere to the drive for modernisation, when they may be located within a highly traditional society. On the subject of women’s education, the studies available primarily deal with public higher educational institutions. This chapter tries to draw on these available studies, to consider the role of private higher education in a critical light. In this regard, Tilak (1983) establishes that there has been remarkable progress in the literacy and educational development of women in India, resulting in some decline in the inequalities between men and women since the inception of planning. However, Sahni and Shankar

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  77 (2012) treat education as a parameter for development and emphasise the need to encompass a gender perspective in education. Further, they argue that there has been no significant inclusiveness in education since independence. It should be noted that Sahni and Shankar present a more recent study, with data from the last 60 years, whereas Tilak’s older study uses data from approximately 30 years. Chanana (1990, 2001) goes beyond the mere presence of females in higher educational institutions (HEI) and asks whether education is pulling women out of their traditional role or, instead, persuading them to remain confined in age-old feminine and familial roles as wives and mothers. This chapter agrees with Chanana’s finding, where she maintains that even education claiming to be modern has not challenged the existing societal framework. Maitrayee Chaudhury (2012) contests the rhetoric of ‘tradition’ and ‘modernity’ by showing how women’s status remains unchanged, despite the drive towards modernisation, which basically hints at an implicit gender politics. In fact, modern education seems to complicate the conditions of female recipients of education because, over-magnifying their empowered status, it overburdens them by adding non-domestic chores to their domestic chores. This is nothing short of an illusionary dimension in which they are convinced to live without contestation. Efforts are being made to ameliorate this, but undue caution exercised in the course of doing so becomes conspicuous in ambivalent standards, where attempts are always made to make women smart, but not too smart, and traditional, but not too traditional (Chaudhury, 2012: 282). In this regard, Pathak (2015) criticises the uncritical glorification of tradition and adoption of modernity. It seems useful to draw on this debate to examine the dialectics of ‘modern’ and ‘traditional’ in private modern single-sex higher education.

Methodology For this ethnographic study of a private women’s university in Rajasthan, researchers observed and interacted with young women aged 18–24 years. We found that these private pedagogical spaces, which claim to be agents of modern values, actually reinforcethe traditional ethos, which seems to confine the women instead of emancipating them. To understand this phenomenon, we conducted 35 in-depth interviews with young women, along with classroom interactions on a daily basis and two outdoor excursions. Beginning in August 2018, the research was 12 months long. We also interacted with teachers, non-teaching staff and a few parents of students, through interviews and telephone conversations, to understand the issues more clearly. Furthermore, we paid close attention to the writings, scribbles and remarks on the walls, elevators, flaps of chairs and toilets relevant to the problem under investigation. These remarks constitute a noteworthy corpus of evidence, replete with multiple meanings. Insights were also drawn from education fairs and admissions-related marketing campaigns organised by the university.

78  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram Our study explores how modernity remains confined to mere outward appearance. This analysis calls for semantic understanding of the university’s appearance, landscapes and texts of marketing brochures, logos and other visual materials used by the institutions thus become noteworthy material for examination, because the aesthetic contents occupy the frontmost space on the display shelf, whereas educative and pedagogic contents get pushed to the invisible locus of the shelf. In other words, substantive elements such pedagogy, teacher quality, potential employment and cognitive development fall by the wayside. Our study entails the interpretation of edited and customised music and videos used by the university for marketing purposes. The oral and visual materials include messages recorded by authorities and students, especially those whose faces enhance saleability. The key purpose for recording scripted statements is to accentuate the aesthetics of the university’s facilities and ambience. The videos which are played on big screens over and over again contain emphatic aerial and angular views of spaces which serve a similar purpose. We could not afford to overlook the care taken by private universities to choose attractive sites for meeting and greeting parents and students. These sites are meant to appeal to parents and students. Frequent conversations with administrative personnel, faculties and students has yielded a great deal of valuable information on the subject. As the statistics reveal, there are several state-run colleges, universities and institutions which cater to the needs of higher education in India (Ministry of Human Resource Development, 2019). But the overall picture shows that women’s entry into the public sphere has become far more difficult, due to the stiff competition resulting from a shrinking public educational space and, to some extent, its co-educational character. The stiff competition, shrinking public education sector and parents’ reluctance to sent their daughters to co-educational public universities give wide scope for the growth of private women’s universities. This situation is an outcome of two events taking place simultaneously: the distancing of women from public higher educational institutions and their attraction to private institutions. Public educational institutions are pushing women out, due to their limited space, which is the national government’s failure. Further, women’s adherence to conservatism (a victimisation of women by the cultural order) allows private universities to attract women by showcasing the high-quality infrastructure, safety and culturally conformist atmosphere.

Findings and discussion From the start, women’s lives remain circumscribed by multiple reinforced boundaries. Although the true purpose of education is to loosen constraining ties, the very instrument of education has been remodelled and reshaped in such a manner that the boundaries continue to harden. Our first finding relates to how this modern single-sex education is restraining the mind and bodies of these young women. Separating female from male is one of the

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  79 constitutive elements of control and regimentation. The study tries to establish that the respondents see this as a process of rendering them unfit for social relationships. A 22-year-old student at the university expressed her dilemma about her life outside the university. She has been on this campus since she was nine years old and studied in the school run by the same establishment. According to her, I never feel very comfortable around men, there is something … I can’t describe, you see I have never been around them so much, so I feel uncomfortable. A majority of the respondents expressed similar concerns. Separating one gender from the other is an integral part of single-sex pedagogy, which adheres to certain aims and purposes. The matter becomes more serious when the modern university, instead of problematising this situation, tries to cash in on it by reinforcing such models. In other words, the idea of single-sex education crystallises the difference between genders on an oppositional footing, thereby reinforcing the divisive binary of male and female. The question this chapter is raising aims not to generalise but to encourage further and deeper probes into the suppressive structure put in place to control female sexuality. In the case of the present study, the problem seems to arise from the process of segregating females from males for a considerable period, during which libidinal and instinctual suppression occurs. The problem deepens further with the end of the educational confinement period and the reintegration of the female body into a society inhabited by both males and females. As a consequence of this process, the informants feel misplaced and describe a lack of confidence and comfort when facing society. This process of segregating and reintegrating the female body creates confusion and dilemmas among young women. The chapter uses two terms borrowed from the work of Hermann Argelander (2013: 337–354) that is, ‘de-sexualization’ and ‘re-sexualisation,’ to explain the resultant chaotic and ambiguous situation for women. The first term pertains to the segregated phase of learning in single-sex schools and colleges, whereas the second term pertains to the reabsorption of segregated women into society. What is it like for women to be stretched between two contradictory realms? It is important to see how parents and the university use the trope of modern education as an instrument to achieve this. It calls to mind Monique Wittig’s perception of ‘gender as the workings of “sex,” where “sex” is an obligatory injunction for the body to become a cultural sign, to materialise itself in obedience to a historically delimited possibility, and to do this, not once or twice, but as a sustained and repeated corporeal project’ (Butler, 2016:190). The idea of single-sex education gives rise to a segregated and secluded space, which over time morphs into a gendered ghettoised space. This accounts for the enormous level of depression among the students. They view this as an unhealthy milieu, because it stops them from essential exposure and necessary adjustments to the real world, which is mixed,

80  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram heterogeneous and plural. Their growing desire to see and meet other, that is, male counterparts need not be understood in purely erotic terms, albeit reasons such as experiencing attraction and desire cannot be brushed aside, either. The aim is to understand the underlying and overlying processes of ‘othering’ female from male through such practices. The space outside is seen as masculinised, which is construed as being dangerous for the female. For this reason, they are kept away from masculinised spaces. While interacting with a group of students from the law department, we were told that these young women are not allowed to attend moot court outside campus, even though this is an integral part of their legal training. University authorities fear that these young women will come into contact with male students at other universities, and the company of males is presumed to spoil their characters and minds. In large measure, this has to do with the notion of ‘sexual morality’ which calls for control continuance thereof (Chatterjee, 1999: 157). This reminds one of the verses of Manusmriti which maintain that a female is to be guarded by her father during her childhood and virginity, by her husband when she is in her youth and by her son when she is old. She is not fit for independence. Independence renders a female vulnerable to danger.3 The notion of that a woman needs to be protected thus owes its historical genesis to an ancient textual tradition and continues to this day, in different forms. These young women from the single-sex university remain isolated and separated from their homes, parents, family, old friends and memories. This kind of ‘isolationism’ reduces freedom by reducing one’s capacity to imagine the alternative possibilities (Garrison & Neiman, 2003: 27). Rather than being oblivious and unconscious of the world outside, there is an intense sense of loneliness. A concerning question which is worth rumination is whether such an approach puts a pathological pressure on the minds of the students, since they have issues of depression, anxiety and separation.

Private-modern-traditional triad: an instrument of control In this ongoing discussion with regard to the private university as a ghettoised space for women’s education, an effort is needed to dispel confusion which looms over the idea of modernity in its relation with the idea of tradition. It is important to avoid equating the private with the modern, because the private can embody both the traditional and the modern. However, the idea of the private in the case of educational institutions appropriates certain aesthetic elements of the modern, which is selective appropriation. Aesthetic elements conforming to European and Western genres of modernity are evident from the architectural nuances of the buildings, auditoria, mess, water bodies, landscaping and street names. Simultaneously, an adherence to tradition is also evident from the performance of traditional rituals for various functions, the naming of certain buildings and having a colossal temple structure with a permanent priestly staff for its daily upkeep. Additional instances of modern practices can be listed, such as

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  81 table manners and the usage of fork, spoon and knife for meals. Eating meals with the hands, which is traditional, is frowned upon. Although wine or liquor is not allowed yet, a special school is in place to impart training in etiquette and manners, which also incorporate a knowledge of wines, including how to hold a wine glass and how to conduct oneself at dinner parties. Moreover, the English language as a medium of instruction constitutes an integral part of the strategy, because even the adherents of tradition welcome it. This has been underlined by Chaudhury (2012: 283), who states that matrimonial advertisements in India employ messages seeking girls who are modern with a traditional outlook. This is something of a ‘liminal kind’ (Bhabha, 2017: 250), where neither modern nor traditional, or where partially traditional and partially modern, give rise to something which cannot be located in a fixed category. Drawing on the idea of Pathak (2015), the private as a custodian of tradition seems to benefit considerably from modernity, insofar as it is viewed as a masculinising and aggressive force, thereby subordinating femininity in its drive for the development of its kind. This symbiotic union of tradition and modernity calls into question the popular perception which often posits tradition and modernity on an oppositional footing. Thus, modernity and tradition can cohabit the same space and complement each other. Since the ownership is private and the motive is profit making, the single-sex private university takes particular care to strike a balance between tradition and modernity, in such a way that age-old traditional patriarchal values are not compromised. This is how it makes its packages of education saleable and profitable. The private modern educational space remains as regulatory as any other form of institutional space. This regulatory regime is justified as being necessary for shaping and grooming the personality of students. Discursive practices which involve the repetition of ideas and acts become internalised and deep-seated by the recipients, to such an extent that most of them tend to treat these practices as normal and beneficial (Pathak, 2015: 185). That is why many students show agreement with the regulatory framework. In an interaction with a 19-year-old second-year undergraduate student, it came to light that in her family, including the larger kinship unit, all girls have studied like this, and it is safe. She further added, Our parents will never send us to Delhi or some other big city, even I feel little scared to go to some big city to study … this is good. The young women are subjected to everyday control, which renders them inured to control throughout their lives. This is where one notices the gradual trimming of critical thinking from the academic landscape. Drawing on Patkar (1995), it would be pertinent to maintain that the northern belt of India, including Rajasthan, epitomises the patriarchal system. People who are overly concerned with the consolidation of the patriarchal structure do not allow critical thinking in pedagogic spaces, because they fear that it would compromise the structure. This concern is quite palpable among

82  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram the parents of young women, and private educational institutions tap into this concern by catering to it. Most of the respondents’ anecdotes reveal that many of the girls were sent to this university because they were caught talking secretly with their male friends over the phone. Many parents would simply have recourse to preemptive measures without having to go through the experience of catching their daughters in connection with the male world or non-normative practices. The educational institution conforms to parental and societal expectations. There is a noticeable continuum of control, which pervades society as well as pedagogical spaces. When these young women are in an educational space, they experience another kind of control and regulation. One informant, a student in the final year of her master’s program in English, was interested in studying lesbianism for her thesis. She was denied permission, on the grounds that ‘it is a disruptive idea.’ The same student was reprimanded by her parents for undergoing tattooing and piercing. Although the presence of female bodies in an aesthetically designed educational place seems empowering, yet, such an image contains a contrary reality, because the prevalent asymmetrical structure goes unchallenged. Rather, it is nurtured here through various means. This calls to mind the idea of the ‘docile body’ (Foucault, 1977), a body which is manipulable, shapable, transformable and improvable. The use of time-tables, attendance sheets, invigilation and the deployment of a surveillance network comprised of wardens, deans, mentors and guards, constitute technologies of control. It begins with a coercive approach and gradually takes to discursive practices, whereby students come to believe and internalise the logic of control. Patkar (1995: 406) argues that the entire teaching–learning process is imbued with a strong gender bias in its pedagogy and is practice–adaptive rather than transformative, confirming women’s education within socially acceptable parameters. Data reveal certain common patterns regarding educational decision-making. The first which came to light showed parents’ concern about the safety of their daughters. Second was the absence of a daughter’s say in the choice of an educational institution. Third, word of mouth by continuing students or alumni tended to persuade students to choose private educational places. Respondents as well as teachers of both sexes expressed serious concern about the level of control exerted upon students with respect to dress, food, behaviour and the timing of activities. There is very strict control over the kind of dress and the manner in which the dress is to be worn by the students and female teachers. Moreover, food from outside or eating out is punishable with fines. What becomes evident from the present study is that the traditional ethos remains very firm and takes precedence over personal and emotional bonds. Emotional bonds are cast aside if parents perceive any defection from tradition on the part of their children. A respondent’s anecdote gives an idea of what ‘control freaks’ these parents remain. She revealed that fathers often remain unequivocal, and mothers forewarn their daughters of dire consequences, in the event of any deviation from traditions. Mothers warn that

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  83 they would not hesitate to kill their daughters in case of transgression from the delineated boundaries. One respondent, a master’s degree candidate, shared a narrative of an incident in Jhujhunu, where a couple tried committing suicide because of fears of their family and society. When their parents and kin came to know of this incident, they force-fed the couple more poison, to hasten the end, instead of rushing them to a hospital. Despite sending their daughter to the university, parents remain vigilant about her activities on campus. We would like to draw attention to an incident where parents furiously barged into the university and dragged their daughter down from her room and beat her in front of all of the other students, because she had revealed her love affair with a boy. The spectacle thus created by parents becomes a model for all, and it works as deterrent. This violent behaviour of parents towards their child did not draw any resistance from university authorities. The confined bodies of these young women are thus de-prioritised, and primacy is attached to patriarchal and traditional norms. Such a restrictive place is a fit metaphor for prison. The emancipatory content of education thus remains absent from the modern private educational space.

Narratives of subversion The process of subordination is not straight and linear, because a form of counter-control was also observed, which generates a vicious cycle of control, subversion and the reassertion of control. In this atmosphere of excessive control, many students try to circumvent the boundaries. This is evident from the narratives of subversion. For instance, students sneak out chapattis from mess, so that they can eat chapattis with a vegetable curry of their choice bought from outside campus, as they are fed up with eating the same food for a long time. It is worth mentioning here that taking food out from the mess, as well as buying food from outside, are both offences punishable with fines. But young women have learnt the art of subversion. The delivery person comes to secret points signposted by the students, where they can hand over the food without being noticed. These places are usually nearby grill boundaries, through which the deliveries are passed in. Students also reported having bribed guards in order to receive eatables from outside. An interesting case of subversion is related to the renting of a hukka (smoking pipe) by a student who remains completely unknown. She used to rent it to other students for one thousand rupees per night. We observed several instances where the university makes concerted efforts towards libidinal suppression. This is indicative of an all-pervasive libido-phobia in both forms: homosexuality and heterosexuality. Society controls sexual expression of all kinds, the more so in the case of unmarried women. The prevalent belief regarding the need to control female sexuality is emphasised by Karuna Chanana (2001: 41), with reference to Leela Dube’s work, in which attention is paid to society which views uncontrolled female sexuality as a danger to the purity of an agnatic and caste group. In words of Pathak (2015), it can be understood as a ‘repressive moral system.’

84  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram Besides understanding sexuality as a dialogic communication, and fighting disruptive forces, an emphasis must be laid upon both the criticism of an unfettered regime of the marketisation of sexuality and a repressive moral system. Overt libidinal expression is viewed as a straightforward subversion of tradition. Such control is expected to be maintained on campus, too. It is not uncommon to chance upon scribbles on the surfaces of walls, tables and elevators that express a prohibited articulation of desire. These scribbles also embody resistance and subversion. There are punitive measures in place to discourage students from engaging in graffiti and scribbles. Any kind of attraction and infatuation is expected to remain suppressed. The prolonged control contributes towards a building up of tension. It is not uncommon to notice various forms of transgression, which brings to mind the idea of transgressive pleasure (Duncum, 2009). Respondents often recollected instances of transgressive and subversive acts and burst into laughter. One remarkable example of such transgression and subversion is engaging in prohibited communication through pseudo-names, where ‘he’ is codified into ‘she’ and vice versa. In the course of interacting, respondents revealed the usage of interesting codified terms which are invective as well as appreciative. Some of the pseudo-names shared by informants include baby (innocent and nice), sakht launda (good looking but unapproachable), chhamia (girlish male), softy (good looking person) chhotu (short statured), lomadi (warden albeit fox metaphor for shrewd), Hitler (for dean or highly authoritative personnel), etc. These arrangements of codified alternative systems of communication in a restrictive place remind one of the movements of Black slaves in South America, who were not allowed to congregate and communicate. Analysing the desire to behave unrestrictedly in a restricted and policed environment is very important, in order to understand the role of codified alternatives as a system.

Duality of reality: apparent and substantive The daily academic and co-curricular activities provided to students on campus, such as theatre, music, drama, and dance, constitute apparent realities. However, our observations reveal that the contents of these activities are closely regulated. Regulations are also evident in such events as student outings, which are very limited and controlled. These realities remain obscured by the cosmetic landscape, which appears highly modern. This cosmetic aspect reminds us of what Chatterjee (1999) discusses with regard to the social reform movements of early and mid-nineteenth-century India, when changes meant for the betterment and liberation of women were largely apparent, rather than substantive (Chatterjee, 1999: 117). It is only through analysis that a better understanding of the underlying truth is possible: here, too, the reality appears merely symbolic, rather than substantive. Modernity, which was celebrated for its potential to liberate women from tradition, is actually being used to strengthen that very tradition. This might also be a case of the ‘selective appropriation of Western modernity’

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  85 (Chatterjee, 1999: 120). This holds true to a great extent when one looks at the structures of the pedagogy followed by private single-sex educational institutions. Modernity should not remain confined to mere appearances. Among other meanings, ‘modern’ fundamentally means progress. This chapter attempts to uncover whether any progress is possible in the modern suppressive milieu under discussion. Our findings conclude that a depressing mood consequent upon this suppressive milieu carries over into the everyday lives of the young women enrolled at such institutions. According to Paulo Freire (2000a), autonomy is an integral element of progressiveness, which remains absent from such settings. Owing to a prolonged preoccupation with their tense mood, these female students often tend to lack ‘epistemological curiosity.’ Instead, their curiosity is diverted towards finding ways to go out, eat different food, dress up freely, watch movies, and the like. This situation produces two consequences, viz., internalisation, where some tend to adapt to societal pressures, and externalisation, where some show instances of inconspicuous as well as conspicuous resistance against institutionalised control. Both of these processes are counterproductive. To understand how sustained suppression leads to a loss of agency, the underlying forces which essentialise ‘womanhood’ need to be brought to light (Puri, 1999). Such essentialisation encompasses the suppression of desire, which is projected as standard, perfect and rational. However, one thing becomes very clear from the foregoing discussion: these are strategies of social control, which becomes normalised as a result of such discursive practices. Anita Superson (2005: 109–126), referring to Sandra Bartky, draws attention to ‘repressive satisfactions or, deformed desires which fasten us to the established order of domination which is attributable to the process of indoctrination, psychological manipulation, and the denial of autonomy.’ Thus, a distinction is drawn between desires and deformed desires, where the latter are attributed to unjust social conditions. On this view, women are made to conform to mores on the grounds that conforming is beneficial, even though such conformity is actually detrimental to the very women who carry it out. This highlights the need to scrutinise the role of female single-sex higher education in the private sector, with respect to the ‘established order of domination.’ As regards agency and autonomy, there is no concrete evidence to establish one single narrative. The students have initiated strikes against poor health and hygiene issues, issues of salary hikes for non-teaching staff and issues concerning the reinstatement of dismissed employees. These strikes and movements point towards the existence of agency, albeit sporadic and episodic, because these strikes took place without any form of an organised student body. There is obviously a need for the concretisation of the agency’s form. One respondent said that ‘unless individual stories become part of collective stories, there is no way out.’ In other words, individual agency and individual effort cannot move the monumental social structure, which is largely patriarchal. Societal priorities, in general, and parental concerns, in particular, determine the future trajectories of these young women. Thus, agency exists, but it is dormant

86  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram and latent, owing to fear and a lack of collectivity. The modern private education does not allow the scope needed for ‘collectivity.’ Gathering in large numbers for any reason is not allowed, unless agreed upon by the administration. Close scrutiny reveals that private single-sex universities, while expected to be modern, and therefore critical, perpetuate the ‘the established order of domination’ rather than becoming sites of liberation. The question therefore is whether private educational spaces can actually afford to be antithetical to the suppressive traditional order. The existing body of evidence demonstrates a wide gap between the promising visuals and underlying practices which constitute the core truth. The evidence of putting girls in single-sex institutions right from the school level seems to be employed as a strategy to normalise the created spatial distance between female and male. Jyoti Puri (1999) suggests that the disciplining of female bodies is enacted not through denial, but through knowledge, in a Foucauldian sense. Growth in the degree of control corresponds to the level of education of females. This implies that a higher level of restraint is exercised on women in higher education. However, what appears most intriguing is that restraining exercises are masked and wrapped up in such a manner that things look normal. The role of modernity as a masking agency cannot be ruled out, in light of the insights gained from the field. All sorts of measures – from the employment of human agencies to technological gadgets – are used to rein in the female mind and body. It is apparent from the foregoing discussion that these young women are controlled and restrained to conform to the norms of the society and family. The role of education seems to have gotten lost, and what they end up with is a piece of paper, a degree from an institution. What role does this degree from a university play? Narratives reveal that most of the students belong to the business class, and finding a job after completing their education is not a concern for them and their families. Similarly, it is important to understand the caste configuration of this business class, which consists largely of Baniya, Brahmin and Rajput. The principal concern of this class-caste is class-caste endogamy, to maintain their privileges (Billig, 1991: 355). An educational degree from a popular private single-sex university like this comes as a proof of a chaste and educated woman. These educated women are considered to confer cultural capital, that is, a narration of praiseworthy status on their family (Ciotti, 2010). Ciotti maintains that this class makes a particular effort to convert economic capital into cultural capital for girls’ suitability in the marriage market. It is interesting to note that there are few meritorious students who are from lower socio-economic strata, and they avail themselves of scholarships offered to them based on merit. Such young women work hard and aspire to obtain jobs. However, the concern for marriage takes precedence over other concerns for both groups. Thus, parents in the lower strata also share concerns about the safety and control of their daughters. Though the students are meritorious, the parents do not wish to send their daughters to better universities far away. Another aspect

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  87 which merits mention is the idea of domesticity, which points to the habit of remaining in an enclosed space. A prolonged stay in an enclosed structure renders these young women suitable for domestic life, which is the norm for women in a patriarchal society. Thus, the university in question also works towards preparing suitable future wives and daughters-in-law. To add further insight to the idea of suitability for marriage, the university claims to be modern through the incorporation of a new department which emphasises Western etiquette and manners. The website of the university introduces this course as follows: to teach the art of social graces, deportment and confidence so that each SEFS student bears the lifetime badge of elegance and dignity encapsulated in the Indian Value System. (School of Etiquette and Finishing Skills, 2020) In the name of manners, a new department, the School of Etiquette and Finishing Skills, has been opened to train women in ballroom dancing, holding an empty wine glass, table manners and housekeeping; under the pretext of elegance, this is a new form of subordination. This particular course was made compulsory for every student of the university, disregarding their choice to join or withdraw. This lack of choice is indicative of a lack of agency. Initially, when the course was optional, many students opted out. Hence, the same course was made compulsory but non-credit-based, despite the fact that many students resisted taking it. Subsequently, the administration made this a compulsory and credit-based course. The students are now forced to attend the class. They complain that they are taught how to hold a wine glass which does not contain wine. The Western mode of female subjugation speaks of a widely prevalent uncritical tendency to romanticise anything which is a Western import. Thus, modern private single-sex higher education ends up being a site of degree production. Students gradually feel deprived of aspirations and vigour and eventually come to terms with the fact that they cannot aspire to move beyond an age-old societal framework.

Conclusion The main focus of this chapter is to examine whether the women in higher education are realising the true essence of the educative process in a pedagogic space, that is, emancipation. Hence, the term ‘emancipation’ has been taken beyond its literal meaning. Education has been understood as a redemptory instrument to realise emancipation from deep-seated institutionalised and hegemonic patriarchal ideas. What is evident from the present study is that suppressive traditional practices have also reproduced themselves. Terms such as ‘new women’ and the corresponding appearance of a ‘new patriarchy’ are indicative of such extended reproduction. The patriarchy, a component of tradition, seemingly in opposition to modern

88  Ravi Shankar and Reenu Ram life, has been reproduced to maintain the age-old hegemony over the minds and bodies of ‘new women,’ who seemed to have gained an education and degrees from higher educational institutions. In other words, the category of new women may appear to have uplifted them through literacy and jobs, but a clear line of distinction needs to be drawn between the idea of being uplifted and that of emancipation. Emancipation is still a mirage for women. Getting jobs as a result of education constitutes just a small fraction of the need for emancipation. Martha C. Nussbaum’s ‘capabilities’ approach is an important analytical tool for the critique of higher education in general, and private female single-sex higher education in particular. Her approach reveals the fact that women are still far from the core purposes of education, because many tend to view the educated and employed status of women as their emancipation, whereas a capabilities framework exposes the fault lines in such a view. Nussbaum (2000) discusses ‘capabilities criteria’ to examine the true benefits of education and of employment consequent upon education and finds that women still remain subservient to needs of the others. Thus, despite all of their cosmetic achievements, women fall short of many capabilities, particularly ‘bodily integrity’ and ‘practical reason,’ which imply one’s freedom to treat one’s body as sovereign and free and critical reflection about planning one’s life, respectively. Nussbaum makes such observations with regard to the condition of women in India, and she draws on the observations of Amartya Sen and Jean Dereze, who also opined that women, despite their educated and employed status, lack space for bargaining and negotiation. Their preferences and choices are often relegated and pushed to the margins. The modern-and-traditional binary seems to have undergone a dialectical process and formed a modern-traditional grid for mutual gain. What has come to the surface as a result of this investigation is that the old forms of control might have been relaxed, but new forms of modernised control have been instituted, which implies that we need to change the lens of focus to view such new forms, which largely remain unseen. The aesthetic and camouflaging power of the modern masks the boundaries and chains used to circumscribe women’s bodies and minds, to the advantage of society’s traditional ethos. The separation of women’s pedagogic space from its counterpart gender, that is, male, is a process of ghettoising the educational space along gender lines. This has prolonged the age-old myth that women’s bodies are to be guarded. However, such a division of space is managed through cosmetic practices such that it is not uncommon to lose sight of the underlying reality, that is, un-free and intangibly subjugated women. Although , the findings of this chapter are with particular respect to a private university, such practices are common across public as well as private spaces of education. After considerable investigation, it has been realised that ‘private’ should not imply ‘modern,’ even though a situation appears modern. Similarly, ‘modern’ does not necessarily denote a redemptory force, because of the problematic modern-traditional grid. For instance, the metaphor consequent upon long discursive practices has resulted in an inseparable

Legitimising patriarchy in the private educational system?  89 entangling of womanly characteristics with weakness and beauty. Likewise, there are several other areas where one can decipher the unread societal dominance and hegemony which has invariably positioned women on the margins. The modern and higher education meant for women hardly seems to address such concerns.

Notes 1 This research was carried out in one of the private women’s educational institutions in Rajasthan. Due to the sensitive nature of the information, this chapter adheres to the anonymity of persons as well as the institute. 2 Such an exercise related to enumeration and survey is part of official and bureaucratic procedures which are considered modern practices. What is lost sight of here is the politics of enumeration and calculative procedures. 3 See Manusmriti verse no. 9.3 and Medhatithi’s commentary on this verse.

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4 The inclusion of minorities in the changing dynamics of education Chingiz Khan

Manipur is a northeastern state in India, surrounded mostly by hills and mountains. Around 92 per cent of the state’s total area is covered by hills. The remaining 8 per cent consists of valley areas. It is a land populated by different ethnic groups, such as Meiteis, Muslims, tribals and non-Manipuris, including Mayangs (Ansari, 1985). This geographical location comprises multilingual, multireligious and multi-ethnic communities, most of which have been settled in Manipur since time immemorial, except the Mayangs and some groups of Kukis. In this multilingual environment, developing a formal education system is a challenging task for policy experts and educationists. Language is an issue that needs to be prioritized in tribal areas, when the teacher is a ‘stranger’ within the community. Mrinal Miri has proposed policy suggestions to ameliorate the conditions for such education. He included establishing a learning process based on the language spoken by the community, the punctuation of the main language, a medium of communication in the classroom in their own language, etc. Moreover, the school curriculum should incorporate the diversity of cultures in the country and must be introduced adequately and with great sensibility, which is difficult in terms of textual and pedagogical circumstances in the tribal regions of northeast (Miri, 2015). The state’s special promotional efforts have undoubtedly resulted in educational progress for the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs), especially in regions where policy implementation combined with the dynamism of reform, and most crucially with anti-caste, Dalit, tribal and religious conversion movements. The growing demand for schooling and its utilization among SCs is reflected in the significant increase in both enrolment ratios and attendance rates, which is clearly seen in Maharashtra (highest) and Andhra Pradesh (lowest). While considering the education of STs, the rates in some states, such as Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Mizoram, Nagaland and West Bengal, are much higher than the national average of 50 per cent. Arunachal Pradesh has the lowest enrolment ratios among northeastern states. The educational conditions among the SCs and STs show certain features of unequal provision and unequal quality, such as inadequate schools available in certain areas of India, a poor implementation of school-level policies on positive discrimination, the poor physical

92  Chingiz Khan infrastructure of schools, inadequate teachers and teaching and a poor provision of teaching and learning materials.2 As far as the socio-economic and political dimensions are concerned, since the beginning of the seventeenth century, the minority Pangal community’s educational status has been extremely deplorable as compared to that of other communities. The present study seeks to identify the role of the state in promoting higher educational institutions, particularly among the Pangal community. It analyses the educational status of the Muslim community in Manipur from the pre-independence period to the present. Whether the reservation system has brought equitable and inclusive education to the Pangals of Manipur is a matter to explore in depth. Is the reservation a significantly inclusive framework, after the Sachar Committee Report of 2006 or the Report on Socio-Economic Survey of Meitei-Pangals (SES-MP) in 2004? How should equitable and inclusive education be brought about, so as to overcome inequality? Given that education reduces inequality in society, does the state follow an ‘inclusive’ and ‘exclusive’ policy towards the most marginalized groups, such as the Pangal community? If so, what is the exact policy that the state is following towards the Pangal community?

The education of Muslims: a historical view Researchers commonly make two assumptions with regard to the origin of the Pangal community in Manipur (Khan, 2014, 2019). The first is that the Pangal community started their settlement in the state during the reign of King Naophanba3 (Parratt, 1998), before the seventeenth century. However, this view was rebuffed by a recent study, which shows that there was no ‘official’ recognition of clans of Pangals who made their settlement before the seventeenth century. Apparently, they might have landed for scouring other assignments because no substantive text and copious information on this account were available and moreover, extensive inter-regional trade was extremely slender. The second assumption is that the year 1606 was a significant landmark, when the settlement of Manipuri Muslims began, and hence this was the first step in realising the manifest destiny of the Muslim community in Manipur. It was ‘Sanongba Higaiwa’ (Sanongba was the younger brother of reigning King Khagemba; higaiwa means ‘false instigation’) which made the way for their settlement in Manipur. Migration was another factor, consolidating populations from neighbouring areas such as Sylhet (modern Bangladesh), Cachar, Assam, Gujarat, Tripura and Burma. Since the first day they settled there, the Muslims have played a crucial role in the social, cultural, political, economic and administrative affairs of the state (Rafayattullah, 1997; Singh, 1985; Singh & Khan, 1973). Khan (2016) discusses the population of Muslims in Manipur from the seventeenth century until the British occupation. On this view, the population of their community actually increased at a commendable rate before the epoch-making event called the Seven Years’ Devastation4 (Chahi Taret

The inclusion of a minority  93 Khuntakpa), from 1819 to 1826 AD. This means that there was a significant population of Muslims in Manipur before the Burmese invasions. In 1873, Robert Brown described the Muslim population of Manipur: There is considerable population of Mussalmans in Manipur, descendants of settlers from Bengal for the most part; they number about 900 families or 4500 men, women, and children. They chiefly reside to the east of the capital. The Manipuris say that from great antiquity, Mussalmans have formed part of the population of the valley, as well as the Hindus. The Mussalman population appears, before the devastation; of the country by the Burmese, to have attained a considerable amount, but as was the case, with all the sections of the Manipur community, the greater portion of the community was brought into captivity, by these ruthless invaders and the present Musalmans are the descendants of the few that then escaped being captured. The Musalman population has undoubtedly arisen almost entirely from the emigrant Bengalis, chiefly from the districts of Silhet and Kachar, who have formed connections with the women of the country and settled in the valley (Brown, 1975: 15). In the Cheitharon Kumpapa, the royal chronicle of Manipur, Meitinggu (king) Mungyampa gave lessons on warfare to his royal son, Yipungo (male) Khagemba (Parratt, 2005; Sharma, 2010). The Cheitharon Kumpapa goes on to say that ‘Khagemba ordered (them) to produce (more) Meetei books and reading and writing began to be taught on a wider scale in 1616 AD’ (Parratt, 2005). Moreover, it is pointed out that Yipungo Aahan Khongjompa began to learn reading and writing (Parratt, 2005). No prohibition was made with regard to the learning and teaching process during the seventeenth century. The art of writing in Bengali script was introduced with the arrival of Muslims in Manipur, as noted by J.C. Higgins (Shah, 2008). After the seventeenth-century settlement of Muslims in Manipur, King Khagemba permitted Muhammad Sani, the qazi and Shanglakpa (posts related to politico-religious affairs), to attend the court. Since Muhammad Sani was well versed in Bengali and Urdu, he was given the task of translating messages delivered from Taraf into Manipuri (Singh & Khan, 1973). However, until then, little attention had been paid to the need for education in the Muslim settlement. The Muslims in Manipur may have learnt the Manipuri language written in Bengali script from religious teachers.5 Scholars have engaged in considerable debate over the introduction of papermaking by the Muslims6 (Khan, 2017b). There was a Lairikyengbam (learned in writing and reading) clan among the Muslims (Rafayattullah, 1997; Singh & Khan, 1973). The Muslims of Manipur believed that English education had destroyed the purity of their creed (Irene, 2010). At first, they restricted themselves to learning Arabic and Urdu and studying the Qur’an (Shah, 2008). The notion of mangba-sengba (impurity and purity) in the reign of Pamheiba (popularly known as Garib Nawaz, Benefactor of the Poor) restricted not only the Pangal community but the entire hill

94  Chingiz Khan population. So, their participation in the sociocultural task of the state was negligible. Because of educational underdevelopment, the social mobility of the community remained static for a long time. Table 4.1 depicts the enrolment rate of Muslim students in different years during the colonial period. There is no evidence of formal religious and secular institutions of education for Muslims in Manipur during the seventeenth or eighteenth centuries or even in the late nineteenth century. This might be due to the Muslims’ lack of interest in education and the role of the Vaishnavite concept mangba-sengba (impurity and purity) in people’s attitudes towards English education. On the other hand, scholars have suggested that, as they came from Sylhet, Manipur Muslims used to teach their children the Persian language at home (Khullakpam, 1997). This practice continued from the reign of King Khagemba (1597–1652 AD) to that of King Gaurashyam Maramba (1752–1753 AD) (Khan, 2014; Khullakpam, 1997). No substantial information pertaining to the educational status of Muslims in Manipur was available during this period. However, the Manipur Muslims started receiving theological education in the latter part of the nineteenth, as is evident from the fact that the first Maulana, namely Maulana Ibadullah (1840–1921), appeared at Irong Cheshaba Mayai Leikai (Thoubal District) and started imparting theological education. Maulana Kiramat Ali and Maulana Abdul Jalil are reported as the earliest persons who went outside of Manipur to study Islamic theology during the reigns of King Chandrakirti (1850–1886 AD) and King Surchandra (1886–1890 AD), after Maulana Ibadullah came back from Sylhet to Manipur in 1871 (Ahmed, 2011; Khullakpam, 1997; Shah, 2003). Moreover, the first madrasa, namely the Madrasa Muhammadiya, known in the early twentieth century as Madrasa Mazharul Uloom, was instituted at Mayang Imphal Bengoon (Imphal West District), whose principal was Maulana Abdul Halim of Wangmayum clan, a student of Maulana Ibadullah (Khan, 2015). And the first haji among the Muslims of Manipur was Amuraba, during the rule of King Gambhir Singh

Table 4.1  Representation of Muslim and other religious communities in school in Colonial Manipur Year 1909–10 1913–14 1918–19 1923–24 1928–29 1935–36

Total Strength of Students

Meiteis

Muslims

Tribals

British Subjects and Others

259 214 141 267 289 832

245 208 132 239 265 673

11 2 2 2 6 24

2 0 3 6 6 40

1 4 4 20 12 95

Source: Administrative Reports of the Manipur Political Agency from 1909 to 1932, 1935–1936.

The inclusion of a minority  95 (1825–1834 AD) (Shah, 2003). This indicates an expansion of theological education, whereby the Manipuri Muslims were acquainted with the doctrines of their religion and rituals associated with religion (Allen, 1980). Presently, there are around 98 madrasas and 342 Maktab Khanas registered under the Waqf Board of four districts in Manipur.7 They follow the Dars-i-Nizami syllabus and Deobandi curriculum, which shows that, apart from teaching theological courses, general foundational courses such as English, Science, Geography and Maths are taught until the fifth standard. Most madrasas in Manipur are privately run, through donations gathered door to door, though there are 30 that are run through state aid, under the Scheme of Madrasa Modernization. The Kerala madrasa’s syllabus and curriculum, however, are not only focused on theological courses but also on modern education, emphasising Computer Science, English, Arabic, Sociology, Economics and Commerce, which are offered at the graduate and post-graduate degree levels (Shefi, 2008). Such adaptations were not found in the syllabus and curriculum of Manipur’s madrasas. Moreover, Arshad Alam has emphasized in the North Indian context, rather than the northeastern regions, except Tripura and Assam, concerning the madrasa modernization programme in Manipur.8 After the establishment of madrasas and LP schools in and around Lilong in the early twentieth century, a priority was given to boys’ education, rather than girls’ education, by confining the latter to domestic work and agricultural activities (Irene, 2010). Historical accounts indicate the educational underdevelopment of the Pangal community. In 1917, for the first time, a member of the Pangal community was sent to Sylhet for further study in Class X, as there was no facility beyond Class IX at Johnstone High School. Similarly, another Pangal was also sent to Sylhet (Bangladesh) for a Class X Examination in 1918–1919 (Singh, 1967). The first graduate among the Pangals was Muhammad Wali Ullah in 1928–1929 (Singh, 1967). Out of the 66 lower primary schools, there were 4 madrasas, 1 Temple of Learning (Tol) and 1 girls’ school in 1911–1912.9 The Faiza M.E. School was established in 1935–1936 near the Minuthong area of Imphal, to impart the basics of a modern English education to Manipuri Muslims (Singh, 1967). World War II and the Second Women’s Uprising (Second Nupi Lan) had many consequences for this region. In Imphal, most middle and high schools were closed, due to the effects of the war. Moreover, many education-related records were lost, due to the bombings by Japanese forces against British forces (Singh, 1967). Until 1998, there were only four Muslim women post-graduates. There were 5,704 matriculates, 1,822 graduates and 86 technical and professional graduates before 1995 (Salam, 2006). In 1955, only two girls passed matriculation and attended college. One female student completed her graduation in 1959. The first master’s degree was held in the community in 1963. With the passage of time, and after Manipur was integrated into the Union of India in 1949, Manipuri Muslims started acquiring a modern education by sending their children to schools and colleges, which means that

96  Chingiz Khan they had changed their attitudes towards modern English education. Of the total who traveled outside the state for education, the ratio was 86.36 male students and 13.64 per cent female students. According to the 2001 census, the Muslim male literacy rate in the rural areas of Manipur was 72.1 per cent, but the female literacy rate was just 37.7 per cent. In urban areas, the literacy rate was 82.2 per cent for male Muslims, yet among female Muslims it was around 51.0 per cent. In 1989, the pass percentage of Muslim students for the High School Leaving Certificate (HSLC) was 1.66 per cent, and 0.73 per cent at the higher secondary level (Irene, 2010). The 2014 National Sample Survey (NSS), 71st round, indicates that the proportion of literate (ages 6 and above) Muslims in Manipur was 80.5 per cent, as against the Hindu 90.7 per cent. Not more than 20 girls completed their master’s degree and graduated in 1979–1980. There were no Muslim girls’ high schools or higher secondary schools, colleges or universities in Muslim-dominated sectors such as Kairang, Kshetrigao, Hatta, Sangaiyumpham, Irong Cheshaba or Thoubal Moijing, but there were government high schools at Yairipok and Lilong Haoreibi (Irene, 2010). For instance, the Sangaiyumpham area has a population of more than 11,000, but educationally, it remained the most backward region, as only two scholars have been doing research up to the present time (Shahni, 2019). Moreover, Irong Cheshaba has a population of more than 6,700, but there is not a single eligible candidate from this area who could be considered for teaching in higher educational institutions (Khan, 2020). Presently, both Muslim men and women have begun to send their children not only to the madrasas or government schools but also to Christian missionary schools and private schools, after realising the relevance of modern English education for securing employment. Compared to the Meitei community, this is quite low. Figure 4.1 depicts the enrolment of the minority community, particularly Muslims, among others. The proportion of Muslims increased during 2012–2013 and 2013–2014, but it remained about the same for the next three years, before jumping to 4.7 per cent in 2017–2018, across genders. The share of other minorities increased dramatically during 2012–2013 and 2013–2014 and decreased significantly in 2013–2014 and 2014–2015. It increased from 2015–2016 onwards. Both males and females saw similar trends with regard to their share in enrolment. The share of Muslims in the total enrolment was higher than that of other minorities in 2012–2013, but this was reversed subsequently, regardless of gender. The main concern for Muslims in the state is the question of underrepresentation in higher education and the failure to implement reservation policies. Though they constitute 8.4 per cent of the total population of the state, according to the 2011 census, their share in the total enrolment in higher education is 4.7 per cent, close to half of its population. Furthermore, no reservation policy earmarked for the Pangals was fully implemented by the state government in different colleges affiliated with Manipur University and in different universities, such as Manipur University, Dhanamanjuri

The inclusion of a minority  97 2012-13

2013-14

2014-15

2015-16

2016-17

2017-18

18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2 0 Muslim

OM

Total

Muslim

Total

OM

Total

Muslim

Male

OM

Total

Female

Figure 4.1  Enrolment of Muslim and other minority communities in higher education in Manipur (2012–2018). Source: All India Survey on Higher Education (AISHE) (2017–2018). Note: OM = Other minorities.

University, etc. Detailed data with respect to the enrolment of the minority community during the last six years, based on AISHE 2017–2018, can be seen in Table 4.5 (Appendix). Table 4.2 shows the graduate-level percentage share of enrolment for OBC (‘Other Backward Classes’) Muslims, which is relatively high, compared to that of OBC Meiteis. The reason behind this is that most Muslim students went to nearby, valley-based colleges. But a large number belonging to the Meitei community went outside the area for higher studies. Since information on the outmigration for higher education has not been corroborated by local data, the representation of OBC Meiteis appears very low. For postgraduation and diploma courses, the percentage share of enrolment for OBC Meiteis is relatively higher than for OBC Muslims. Admission based on entrance exams caused the low percentage of OBC Muslims Table 4.2  Percentage share of enrolment with respect to population10 Enrolment Categories Undergraduate Postgraduate Diploma

%

Meitei OBC

Muslim OBC

Meitei

Muslim

13,661 433 223

3,926 28 43

1.0437 0.0331 0.0170

1.4277 0.0102 0.0156

Source: Census of India, 2001 and 2011.

98  Chingiz Khan in higher education, and so far, no reservation (4 per cent) has been fully implemented by the state government in this regard. Details pertaining to Table 4.2 can be found in Table 4.6 (Appendix). The SES-MP, 2004 Report on Manipuri Muslims captures a huge gap between boys and girls staying outside Manipur for education, with 86.36 per cent boys, as against the 13.64 per cent girls. Similarly, the dropping out of students aged 5–14 years was as high as 26 per cent, due to heavy pressure to complete household activities, and 21 per cent of them could not continue their education for economic reasons (SES-MP, 2004). Table 4.3 depicts that out of the total Muslim population in the state, i.e. 239,836 (8.4 per cent of the total population of the state) in the 2011 census, around 1.98 lakh are more than 6 years old. Out of 1.34 lakh literates, nearly 80,000 are male and around 55,000 are female. Among the Muslims, the total literacy rate was 67.76 per cent, with 80.33 per cent male and 55.22 per cent female. If we compare these figures with the literacy rates of other communities in the state, the figures for Muslims fall short of the percentage for males, which surprisingly reached the 80 per cent mark, quite close to the state average (Shah & Khan, 2019). There is a perceptible gap between the number of male and female literates among Muslims in Manipur, i.e. out of 1.34 lakh Muslim literates in the state, nearly 79,000 (59.18 per cent) are male, and 55,000 (40.82 per cent) are female. But if we compare the percentage of Muslims who pursue higher education to the total literate males and females, the figure surprisingly comes close, with males and females being 2.53 and 2.14 per cent, respectively. Having only about 2–3 per cent of the literate population of males and females pursuing higher education is disheartening, but that the percentage of males and females pursuing higher education among Muslims is almost equal is quite encouraging (Shah & Khan, 2019).

Reservation11 for the Muslim minority community In 2006, the Rajinder Sachar Committee Report12 revealed that Indian Muslims remained the most disadvantaged in education and government occupation. The committee reinforced the adoption of a reservation system for the community, to prioritise their hiring for jobs in education and government as well as in legislative bodies from parliament to panchayats, on the pattern of reservations given to SCs/STs. The community is not only socially, politically, educationally and economically at par with the Dalits but have also been left helpless after the partition (Rehman, 2013). However, we could find no substantial proof of the direct implications of the Sachar Committee Report 2006 on the Manipuri Muslims, who received a 4 per cent reservation in employment and admission to professional institutes for OBCs, but the Report on SES-MP 2004 had a direct impact on the reservation policy being implemented for Manipuri Muslims in 2006. To a certain extent, it had an indirect impact on Manipuri Muslims, as both reports were published in the public domain in the same year. To some extent, the role of

Table 4.3  District-wise literacy rate of Muslims (male and female) in Manipur (2011) Literacy Districts

Female

Total

Total

%

population

Literacy

%

population

Literacy

%

18,691 10,7323 24,298 80,199 230,511 1,115 3,086 1,649 589 2,886 9,325 239,836

8,567 61,017 14,256 44,892 12,8732 798 1,793 944 381 1,644 5,560 134,292

45.83 56.85 58.67 55.98 55.85 71.57 58.10 57.25 64.69 56.96 59.62 55.99

9,350 53,819 12,114 40,023 115,306 629 1,739 907 320 1,503 5,098 120,404

5,368 36,385 8,296 25,993 76,042 481 1,214 553 224 960 3,432 79,474

57.41 67.61 68.48 64.95 65.95 76.47 69.81 60.97 70.00 63.87 67.32 66.01

9,341 53,504 12,184 40,176 115,205 486 1,347 742 269 1,383 4,227 119,432

3,199 24,632 5,960 18,899 52,690 317 579 391 157 684 2,128 54,818

34.25 46.04 48.92 47.04 45.74 65.23 42.98 52.70 58.36 49.46 50.34 45.90

Source: Census of India, 2011.

The inclusion of a minority  99

Bishnupur Thoubal Imphal West Imphal East Total Valley Ukhrul Chandel Senapati Tamenglong Churachandpur Total Hill Total Manipur

Male

100  Chingiz Khan the state towards the minority Pangal community in Manipur is quantitatively small. This is because of the data available with regard to the health, educational, employment and other relevant public service sectors. There is a need for serious attention from the state for the welfare of the community and to improve their pathetic and deplorable educational condition. The number of first-, second- and third-class officers is very negligible, though in lieu of official data there is only data gathered independently by one of the registered organizations, Manipuri Muslim Online Forum.13 The root cause of the underdevelopment of the Muslim community in Manipur is the negligence of the government, poverty, the ‘token intellectuals,’ who are discernible apologists, and a large number of incompetent and political capital deficit leaders among the Manipur Muslim community. Moreover, there are many flying monkeys and yes-men political workers among the Muslims of Manipur. Despite being the largest minority community in Manipur, their educational status is extremely deplorable compared to those of other minority communities. There has been no significant improvement in the educational condition of Muslims for many decades. Further, little intervention by the state can be seen from the reservation-cum-quota system in jobs and employment, after the announcement of a 4 per cent reservation on 27 December 2006, in the previous government.14 The 4 percent reservation that was already given to Muslims (Meitei-Pangals) in government employment and admission to professional courses for OBC’s shnould be extended to non-professional also. It is evident that though the Pangal community comprised more than 8 per cent of the total population, according to 2011 census, they held only 2.57 per cent of the government’s grade I and II jobs.15 The actual effect of the reservation on the OBC communities is depicted in Table 4.4.

Table 4.4  Reservation for OBCs in appointments to government posts/services and admission to professional institutes Sl. No

Name of the Community

1

Meitei/Meiteis (including Meitei Brahmin, Meitei/Meetei Sanamahi, Meitei Rajkumar and Non-Scheduled Caste Lois) Meitei-Pangal Telis who have been domiciled in Manipur for 10 years, and their descendants Badi (Nepali), Damai (Nepali), Gairey (Nepali), Satki (Nepali) and Kami (Nepali) who have been living in Manipur as members of the community domiciled 09/07/1947, and their descendants

2 3 4

Percentage of Reservation (%) 12.5% 4% 0.50% 0.50%

Source: Office Memorandum, Department of Personal and Administrative Reforms (Personal Division), Imphal dated 27 December 2006.

The inclusion of a minority  101 Twenty seats are exclusively reserved for tribal groups in the 60-member Manipur State Assembly, out of 29 officially recognized tribal groups, and there is a reservation of up to 31 per cent in all government jobs. But in contrast, Muslims have been forced to recoil in their own ghettos, without any kind of help from the state.16 In this context, Sajjad Hassan claims that states like Manipur and Andhra Pradesh have recently taken affirmative action by enacting legislation specifically for Muslims, creating sub-quotas for Muslim OBCs within the OBC quota. As the entire OBC Muslim community was socially and educationally underdeveloped, they are eligible for affirmative action under Article 15 (4) of the Constitution. This provides a political settlement to access entitlements for Muslims and state legitimacy in the future. He further said that these states have taken such steps after the Sachar Committee Report.17 In reality, it hardly made any improvement for the minority and marginalized Pangal community. They still lag behind the other religious communities but are certainly at the formative stage of upward social mobility in Manipur.18 Extending the reservation policy is desirable for the community’s transformation. The state needs to be proactive for the improvement, development and stability of this community, along with other communities, to achieve a balanced developmental state in future.

Higher education There is a negligible number of higher educational institutions in Manipur belonging to the Pangal minority community. In this ethnically sensitive state, higher education has spread across different ethnic groups in the course of the centuries in Manipur, with respect to the number of institutions and enrolment of students. In 1946–1947, there was only one college, Dhanamanjuri College (DM) (now a deemed university), which marked a sustainable venture in the task of higher education in Manipur (Kengoo, 2012). Lilong Haoreibi College, which was set up at Thoubal District in 1976, affiliated with Manipur University, is the lone college of the Pangal minority community. One cannot ignore the contribution of the late founding principal of the college, Md. Abdul Wahab (Devi, 2014; Salam, 2006), who was instrumental in establishing a college for Muslim higher education, particularly for girls. The college was established after persuasion and negotiation with local people in the Lilong area. During the reign of Maharaja Churachand Singh of Manipur (1891–1941), a portion of land in Lilong Ushoipokpi, referred to as Sanpham (grazing place of cows and bulls), was reserved by Muslim leaders for the college. Donations were collected from Lilong, regardless of caste, creed and religion, to establish and manage the institution. The college further developed under the aegis of the then chief minister of the state, Md. Alimuddin. He also took initiatives in 1970s to establish Manipur University and the Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in 1972 at Imphal. During his tenure, in 1972, he established the Manipur Board of Secondary Education and conducted the first High School Leaving

102  Chingiz Khan Certificate Examination. The general Hospital at Lamphelpat (Imphal) was established and is now one of the preferred hospitals in the northeast region. The Post Graduate Centre of Jawaharlal Nehru University, Imphal, was expanded further by adding three new courses: Manipuri Language and Literature, Political Science and Applied Biology. The Manipur Public Service Commission (MPSC) was introduced, to conduct higher education examinations. Many other socio-economic activities, such as the establishment of Khandsari Sugar Mill in Wangbal (Thoubal District) in 1973, were begun. A law college was also started in this region. On a massive level, Md. Alimuddin has completed substantial educational projects. But, for the minority community under his leadership, it is alleged that he did not enhance their educational status (Khan, 2020; Salam, 2006). Subsequently, there has been a growing awareness of the importance of general education among the Muslim community in Manipur (Devi, 2014). The progress of the college was delayed on account of the premature demise of the founding principal, Md. Abdul Wahab in 1982 (Devi, 2014). Subsequently, efforts were made to affiliate the college with Gauhati University, as a minority institute, until it became a part of Manipur University in 1980. Generally, the college placed great emphasis on the recruitment of female teachers. At first, there were two female students in the twelfth standard. The college governing body members worked hard to increase the number of female students. The minority community faced many obstacles to managing higher educational institutions, from government schemes and policies, a government full of discernible apologists, a lack of financial support and a lack of well-experienced and qualified community leaders, to inadequate support from the community itself. They could not cover all of the areas involved, except the Lilong. In 2015, a press was set up to provide print media for the community (Khan, 2017a). Why the Muslim community is lagging behind other communities, particularly in education, the pillar of sustainable development for any community, can be understood clearly from the aforementioned factors. How can a community remain a full-fledged development community in the field of education, given their pathetic and uncertain condition? The enquiry on the state’s ‘exclusive’ and ‘inclusive’ policy for this minority community is somehow relevant nowadays. Inclusive policies are to be explored timely for the progress of the community. But at the same time, the exclusive characteristics of the state towards education and employment in Manipur has not yet been exposed. Not following reservation norms in admissions for higher studies and research informs the exclusionary tendency of the authorities. Nowadays, higher educational institutions have been expanded over the years in Manipur, including central and state universities, and private universities. Of the total of 68 colleges, 34 are government colleges, 8 are government aided, 18 are permanently affiliated private and 13 are private affiliated colleges.19 There are around seven women’s colleges in Manipur. As regards the number of students enrolled in the colleges, there have been

The inclusion of a minority  103 tremendous changes in the distribution of higher education. From 60 students in 1947–1948, it rose to 35,424 in 2001–2002. The share of girl students in the total enrolment has also increased multifold, from 2.01 per cent in 1950–1951 to 44.3 per cent in 2001–2002.20

Conclusion The Manipuri Muslims have encountered many challenges concerning their educational, social, cultural and political affairs in the state. First, a religious misconception was one of the foremost challenges, begun in the seventeenth century and lasting until the late nineteenth century. It led to depriving them of an equitable inclusive education. Considering English education as ‘impure’ in the early period of their settlement in Manipur was a major reason. Such misconceptions adversely affected the development of education in some sections of the Pangal community in Manipur (Khan, 2014). But gradually, they began to realise the significance of English education. Second is their low socio-economic situation, as evidenced from their standard living conditions. Living along the riverbanks of rural areas, depending upon agriculture for their livelihood, with poor economic conditions, restricts educational mobility. The persistence of a higher rate of dropouts from schools excludes many from pursuing higher educational studies. As a way to level the playing field, vocational education does not effectively work among the members of this community. Many parents have had the misconception that girls studying at outside universities bring ‘impurity’ to the family. The Pangal community is considered as the ‘namesake’ community in all fields, as they were left out of the syllabi of textbooks by the Manipur Board and other councils of higher study (Khan, 2020). There is an absence of systematic arrangements for modern educational subjects, such as Computer Science, Social Science, Science and Commerce in maktabs and madrasas and a lack of fully dedicated, experienced and qualified leaders among the Manipuri Muslims. Lastly, there is a need for modernization of madrasas (Jhingran, 2005). But there is a stiff opposition from some madrasas over the issue of madrasa modernization, as they assume that their land seems to have been usurped. There is anxiety among them that the syllabus seems to have been diluted, on the pretext of madrasa modernization; it needs wider consultation before being fully implemented. The establishment of higher educational institutions for the minority community should be initiated by the state, to bring their educational status at par with that of the other communities. The existence of many premier higher educational institutions for minorities in other states, such as Jamia Millia Islamia (Delhi), Aligarh Muslim University (Aligarh), Osmania University, Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU) (Hyderabad), etc., have brought about visible changes in the status of education among the Muslims of India. However, this has had little impact on Manipuri Muslims. A consciousness of the significance of modern education, along with employment and self-employment schemes, needs to be imparted among

104  Chingiz Khan the Muslims of Manipur. Scholarships and incentives are necessary, to aid the deprived and poor Muslims in Manipur. Subjects such as Computer Science, Management and Commerce should be introduced as a part of madrasa educational reform, to each and every government-recognized madrasa in Manipur, so as to enable them to bring about an equitable society. Dedicated, experienced and veritable Muslim leaders need to inspire the next generation to undertake higher studies, which is indispensable for the community’s progress. A strong civil society organization should be formed by the state of Manipur, to uplift the conditions of primary, secondary and higher educational learning, to bring equitable and inclusive education. Instead of prejudiced attitudes towards educating girls, parents should be oriented and guided by reason and a sense of gender equality. To conclude, the reservation system has provided significant momentum towards educational progress involving the socio-economic and political tasks of the Muslim community in India, particularly in Manipur. Yet, there is lack of motivation on the part of Muslims to encourage youth to undertake higher-level studies. A wider awareness of the significance of education and socialization are necessary for the upward mobility of minorities in India. This chapter demonstrates the educational underdevelopment and lack of employment opportunities among the Muslim minorities, in the light of historical accounts and empirical observations. Vocational, Commerce, Management and Computer courses need to be introduced in due course to the madrasa syllabus, as a part of madrasa modernization. To give basic primary and secondary education to females, on a par with the education of males, is needed to challenge the patriarchal mindset that has existed since medieval times. The state of Manipur should be proactive in giving educationally related funds and incentives to marginalized Muslims, to achieve an equitable and inclusive society.

Notes 1 Many historical sources, such as the The Cheitharon Kumpapa (the royal chronicle of Manipur), Khairuddin Choudhury’s monograph, The Manipuri Mohammedan, R.K. Jhalajit Singh’s A Short History of Manipur, etc., mentioned that the word ‘Pangal’ seems to have been derived from the word ‘Bangal,’ meaning men of east Bengal. The word ‘Bangal’ was corrupted into ‘Pangal,’ because most Manipuris in the seventeenth century pronounced ‘b’ as ‘p.’ In the medieval period, any man from East Bengal, regardless of his religion, was called ‘Pangal.’ There were Pathans, Sheikhs, Syeds and Mughals among the Manipuri Muslims. Another account was also given in the Persian text Yaddasht KursiNama, by Rafayattullah, pertaining to the word ‘Pangal,’ that the word was designated by King Khagemba to the Muslims, particularly their commander-inchief, Muhammad Sani. On account of Sani’s fortitude and intrepidness in the battle fought between Manipuri Meiteis and Muslims at Toubul (near Bishnupur District) in 1606 AD, King Khagemba called him ‘Panganba,’ and his Muslim troops were referred to as ‘Pangal.’ Since then, the term ‘Pangal’ has been used for Muslims by other religious communities. As a matter of fact, the word ‘Pangal’ has come to mean ‘strength’ in the Manipuri language.

The inclusion of a minority  105 2 National Focus Group Position Papers. Retrieved on 3 October 2020, from https://ncert.nic.in/focus-group.php?ln= 3 There is extensive debate regarding the dating of King Naophangba. The royal chronicle states that King Naophangba ruled Manipur in 428–518 AD. The date of his reign is still problematic and inconclusive. 4 The maximum trauma in the history of Manipur was the Chahi Taret Khuntakpa, known as the Seven Years Devastation war, as described by historians and scholars. There was chaos and anarchy in the valley, and the same was felt in the hilly areas, too. Many scholars said that such an episodic event was due to many factors, externally and internally. One of the foremost internal factors that led to the plague of the Burmese invasion was the succession of weak rulers after the reign of Pamheiba (Garib Nawaz), besides other factors, such as conspiracy and revolts, the implications of the roles of conversion from the religion of Sanamahi to hardcore Vaishnavite Hinduism, military defects, treacherous acts in the war of succession after the reign of Pamheiba, etc. On the other hand, the main external factor was the height of the imperialistic ambition of the Burmese in the east of their own territory. There were seven puppet or nominal Manipuri rulers under the supervision of Burmese kings. This event was the worst human disaster, as far as the war in Manipur was concerned. The plight of the innocent public, including Muslims and Hindus particularly, was of beggars description. The cruel Burmese troops scared the public by burning villages one after another. They were so cruel that they used to torture the Manipuri people, irrespective of religion, piercing their palms with thin canes and by drawing them by means of fast-riding horses. Many people were taken into their own country as slaves. The kingdom was deserted for seven years. A treaty was signed in 1826 by the AngloBurmese for the sake of Manipur, where Manipur was in favor of the British in this treaty, known as the Treaty of Yandabo. With the help of the British, the Manipuri Raja Gambhir Singh expelled the Burmese from the soil of Manipur. This event was a major historical turning point in the history of Manipur, because of the fact that interference and relationships between the British and the Manipuri, which had started slowly, were fruitfully taken up by the British around 1891 AD, when Manipur was annexed under the British dominion. For details, see Parratt (2009: 82–84); Birachandra (2009: 60); Khullakpam (1997: 13–16); Kamei (1991: 289–290). 5 There is a tradition that Muslim ritual practices and rites had been taught initially by the three Sayyids, namely Sayyid Ambia (the younger brother of Sayyid Auriya, who was the religious teacher of the Nawab of Taraf, Muhammad Najiri), Sayyid Abdullah and Sayyid Kalka Hussain, who came from Sylhet in 1609 AD. During this time, Sayyid Kalka Hussain brought the Qur’an to Manipur. When they were asked by King Khagemba why they came to Manipur, they responded that they came for the purpose of praying to God at a place called Nongmaijing Hill (Imphal East District). Later on, as advised by the king to settle in Manipur, they accepted the proposals of the king, who presented local ladies to marry to each of the three Sayyids and started their settlement from that time onwards. All of the theologically related works were handed over to the three Sayyids. 6 The debate turns on the issue of whether the art of papermaking was introduced by the Muslims coming from Sylhet or whether the system was in existence before the arrival of the Muslims in Manipur. Moirangthem Chandra Singh staunchly attested that the art of paper manufacture, from jute as a basic material, was practiced by the local community prior to the landing of Muslims in Manipur. This is firmly validated by the other pandit achouba, namely Moirangthem Narendra, and clarified on the ground that the techniques used by the Meiteis for paper manufacture might have been diffused and entered into Manipur from China. In Manipur, there was a yek-salai (clan) called thoudam,

106  Chingiz Khan which was derived from thoutam, meaning those who left work and entered into another occupation. Further, scholar Chittreswar Sharma has opined that it is difficult to trace the name of the yek-salai (clan) belonging to Meitei community which manufactured paper under royal patronage. Sharma argues that the art of papermaking was not mentioned in any of the Puyas available in the archaic Manipuri language, such as Loiyumba Shilyen, Masinlon, Keiroi Masil, Phamlon and Potna. It is possible to argue that no firm evidence relevant to the art of papermaking has been brought to light. On the other hand, most scholars agree that the Cheshaba clan is credited with the introduction of the art of papermaking in Manipur. Sheikh Chuned/Zunaid, the second brother of Muhammad Sani, the general of Muslim forces in 1606 AD, introduced the process of paper manufacture in Manipur through the use of bamboo. Again, some puyas such as Nongsamei Puya, Pangal Thorakpa, the Cheitharon Kumpapa and one Persian text, Yaddasht Kursi-Nama, documented that Sheikh Chunaid, whose family title or clans name was given as Cheshaba by King Khagemba (1597–1652 AD), made paper in Manipur. 7 The information is being gathered from the Waqf Board of Manipur. 8 Alam, Md. Arshad. Modernity and the madrasa. Retrieved 20 September, 2020, f r o m   h t t p : / / w w w. n e w a g e i s l a m . c o m / i s l a m i c - s o c i e t y / a r s h a d - a l a m / modernity-and-the-madrasamadrasa/d/104028 9 Administrative Report of the Manipur State for the Year 1911–12, p. 11. 10 Expected Population: we have derived the Expected Population of Meiteis and Muslims for the year 2017 using the exponential growth rate. The exponential population growth rate is derived from the censuses of 2001 and 2011. 11 The term ‘reservation’ is a controversial issue for various scholars concerning to Muslims in India, because theoretically, in terms of religion, there is no provision for reservation. But from the point of view of underdevelopment after the Mandal Commission recommendations were implemented, there would be new hope for Muslims in India, as they have reservations for Dalit Muslims and Dalit Christians within the OBC category. The reservation system followed in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, etc. were criticised by the Vajpayee-led government, which termed it as ‘unconstitutional’ and ‘illegal.’ He emphasised more on Mandal Commission categories of giving reservation to Muslims in India rather general reservation as the elite or noble groups known as ‘ashraf’ would not treat them equitably and capture the opportunities from the low born Muslims called ‘ajlaf.’ Manipuri Pangals are included in the OBC category as ‘Meitei-Pangal’ after the ‘unfortunate’ incident of the May 1993 Riots between Pangals and Meiteis. The Report of the One-Man Commission of Inquiry headed by Justice D. M. Sen (Retired Judge of Gauhati High Court) to Enquire into the Incidents of the Group Clashes on 3rd May, 1993 in the State of Manipur exposed the weakness and backwardness of Pangals and further recommended that Pangals be included in the OBC category. Peaceful protests, bandhs and strikes took place regarding the movement for reservation for Pangals, before the 4 per cent reservation in employment and admission in professional institutes was implemented on 27 December 2006 (Engineer, 2004). 12 The Sachar Committee Report describes the six decades of institutional neglect and bias that have left the country’s Muslims far behind other Socio-Religious Communities (SRCs) in the areas of education, employment, access to credit, access to social and physical infrastructure and political representation. It aims to change the socio-economic status of Indian Muslims, if it is properly implemented, similarly to the Mandal Commission for the OBCs. This report mentions the backwardness of Muslims in society, the economy and education as serious issues requiring attention. Educationally, the Muslim literacy rate was 59.1 per cent in 2001, which is low compared to the national level of 65.1 per cent. The enrolment process has increased in recent years among the Muslims of

The inclusion of a minority  107 India, as they focus on modern education. There were some disparities between Muslims and SRCs from 1953–2001, a gap which need to be filled. There has been the highest drop-out rate among Muslims at the primary, middle and higher secondary levels, compared to SRCs. It may be noted that only 17 per cent of Muslims (17 years and older) have completed matriculation, compared to 26 per cent for all SRCs. The committee reports that only one out of 25 undergraduates, meaning 4 per cent, attends the premier colleges of the country. Similarly, out of 50 postgraduate students, only one was a Muslim, which means 2 per cent. This shows a gap between the SRCs and Muslims, alongside the increase in education. This report has an indirect implication upon the Manipuri Muslims’ 4 per cent reservation-cum-quota by the state government. Moreover, though the historical setting and sample used in the survey and methodology are not clear, SES-MP 2004 is the first survey in the history of Manipuri Pangals that shows the underdevelopment of the Pangal community in the fields of education, society and the economy. 13 Manipuri Muslim Online Forum. Retrieved 20 September, 2020 from https:// w w w. f a c e b o o k . c o m / n o t e s / m a n i p u r i - m u s l i m - o n l i n e - f o r u m / w h o s who/512023142161851/. This organization has Regd. No 618/M/SR/2014. Based on this registered organization’s independently formulated data, it is pointed out that it provides some relevant data quantitatively in such a manner that there are 13 Politicians; 63 Academics; 32 Officers in Government Departments/Central/State; 31 Manipur Police; 12 Officers in Army and Paramilitary; 24 Islamic Scholars; 24 Research Scholars; 36 Writers; 62 Doctors; 53 Engineers; 3 Special Contractors (Govt.); 9 Social Workers; 15 Gold Medalists; 7 Journalists; 13 Advocates; 18 Sportspersons and Administrators: A) IAS/IFS/IRS/MCS-15 B) IPS/MPS/APS-16 C) SDC/MFS/MSS-7. Such numbers have increased, because this data was tabulated in 2012 and updated in 2018. From 2018 onwards, no update has been made. 14 Office Memorandum, Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms (Personal Divisions), Government of Manipur, dated 27 December 2006. 15 Manipur grants a 4 per cent quota for Muslims in Manipur. Retrieved 20 September, 2020, from http://www.rediff.com/news/2006/dec/29quota.htm 16 Rizwan, Mudassir. A look at their socio-economic condition. Retrieved 20 September, 2020, from http://twocircles.net/2010jan11/muslims_manipur_ look_their_socio_economic_condition.html#.Ve0RxhGqqko 17 Hassan, Sajjad. Muslim exclusion in india: A review of the literature. Retrieved 20 September, 2020, from http://centreforequitystudies.org/muslim-exclusionin-india-a-review-of-the-literature-by-sajjad-hassan 18 Only five Pangal candidates have cleared the Civil Service Exam conducted by UPSC so far, namely Noor Rahman Sheikh IFS (2003–2004) who is now the Consul General of India, Altab Hussain IRS (2007), Yumkhaibam Sabir IFS (2012), S. Asker Ali IAS (2015) and Akram Ali Shah IAS (2020). Only a handful of persons have cracked the state PCS Exam namely, Halim Chaudhury, A. Rahman Khan, Abdur Rahaman Khan, Samim, Sheikh Abdul Hakim, Farook Khutheibam, etc. The number of professors in the Muslim community of Manipur is easily obtained. Only one Pangal male assistant professor teaches at the Biotech Department of Manipur University. The number of Muslim boys and girls, who are obtaining an M. Phil or PhD at Manipur University and other outside universities, such as Delhi University, Aligarh Muslim University, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Jamia Milia Islamia, etc., is relatively less. The available data show that since 1984, only five candidates, such as Md. Badaruddin, Md. Serajuddin, Md. Shakil Ahmed, Md. Nazir Ahmed, and Farooque Ahmed have been awarded PhDs from the Department of History, Manipur University. Presently, there are more than 12 research scholars in different subjects in Manipur University.

108  Chingiz Khan 19 List of colleges in Manipur University. Retrieved 29 September, 2020, from http://entrance-exam.net/list-of-colleges-in-manipur-university 20 Singh, N. Samungou. A view on the present higher education system of Manipur. Retrieved 29 September, 2020, from http://epao.net/epPageExtractor. asp?src=education.A_View_on_the_Present_Higher_Education_System_of_ Manipur.html.

References Ahmed, M. S. (2011). Essays in sociology: Muslims in Manipur. New Delhi: Institute of Objective Studies. Allen, B. C. (1980). Gazetteer of Manipur and Naga hills. New Delhi: Gian Publication. Ansari, S. A. (1985). Some aspects of the geography of Manipur. New Delhi: B. R. Publishing Corporation. Birachandra, N. (2009). Seven years devastation (1819–1826). Imphal: P. S. Publications. Brown, R. (1975). A statistical account of Manipur. (Original work published 1873). New Delhi: Mittal Publication. Devi, K. K. (2014). Dawn of Muslim women education at Lilong. International Journal of Language, Literature, and Humanities, II(I), 34–44. Engineer, A. A. (2004). Reservation for Muslims. Economic and Political Weekly, 39(36), 3984–3985. Irene, S. (2010). The Muslims of Manipur. New Delhi: Kalpaz Publication. Jhingran, S. (2006). Madrasa modernization programme: An assessment. Economic and Political Weekly, 40(53), 5540–5542. Kamei, G. (1991). History of Manipur: Pre-colonial Manipur (Vol. 1). New Delhi: National Publishing House. Kengoo, K. Z. (2012). Higher education among the Tangkhul Nagas: Problems and challenges- a study in Ukhrul district of Manipur. Unpublished PhD thesis. Mumbai: Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS). Khan, M. C. (2014). Socio-cultural and religious facets of Manipuri Muslims during the 17th and 18th centuries. International Journal of Research, 1(8), 1451–1482. Khan, M. C. (2015). The formation of Muslim community in Manipur during the 17th and 18th centuries. Unpublished M. Phil Dissertation. New Delhi: Jawaharlal Nehru University. Khan, M. C. (2016). Settlement and migration of Muslims in northeast India with special reference to manipur. The Quarterly Review of Historical Studies, LVI(1& 2), 31–53. Khan, M. C. (2017a). Mapping the roles of media in shaping the misrepresentations and misconceptions about the Muslim community in Manipur. A Journal of Media Studies, 32(1), 115–132. Khan, M. C. (2017b). Status and contributions of Muslims in Manipur. Man and Society- A Journal of North East Studies, XIV, 97–123. Khan, M. C. (2019). The origin of Manipuri Muslims during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Thon’g. Sylhet: Manipuri Muslim Community of Bangladesh. Khan, M. C. (2020). Despite indigenization since early 17th century or earlier, Pangals of Manipur remain impoverished and ostracized. Retrieved 30 September 2020, from https://www.fpsjreview.in/home/articles/348/

The inclusion of a minority  109 despite-indigenisation-since-early-17th-century-or-earlier-pangals-of-manipur-remain-impoverished-and-ostracised Khullakpam, K. (1997). Turko-Afghangee Chada Naoda. Imphal: Circles. Miri, M. (2015). The nation and its northeast. History and Society (NMML occasional paper), 81, 1–25. MOBC. (2004) Report on socio-economic survey of Meitei Pangals (Manipuri Muslims). Imphal: Directorate of Eco. & Statistics and Directorate of MOBC, Government of Manipur. Parratt, J. (Ed). (1998). Notes on Meithei (Manipuri) beliefs and customs. Imphal: Manipur State Archives, Government of Manipur. Parratt, S. N. A. (2005 & 2009). The court chronicle of the kings of Manipur: The Cheitharon Kumpapa. Vols. 1 and 2. London: Routledge. Rafayattullah. (1997). Yaddasht kursi-nama. (Original work published Lahore, 1929). (M. M. Jalaluddin et al., Trans.). Imphal: Circles. Rehman, H. (2013). Why reservation for Muslims? Delhi: Gyan Publishing House. Salam, M. A. (2006). Political participation of Muslims in Manipur, (1948–2000). Unpublished PhD thesis. Imphal: Manipur University. Shah, A. H. S. (2008). The Manipur governance to the Meetei-Pangal (Manipuri Muslim). Imphal: Pearl Publication. Shah, M. B. (2003). Pambei. Imphal: Muslim Writers Forum. Shah, M. B., & Khan, M. C. (2019). The state of affairs of Pangal women: A feminist perspective. Feminist Research, 3(1–2), 10–20. Shahni, P. S. (2019). Educational status of Pangal community: A field study from Manipur. The Companion, 1–5. Sharma, Kulachandra. (2010). 1891gi mamangda leiramba meitei-pangal (manipuri muslim) gi fibam. Imphal: Writer’s Union Manipur. Shefi, A. E. (2008). Islamic education in Kerala with special reference to madrasa education. Kalady: Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit, Kalady. Singh, O. B., & Khan, M. A. J. (Ed.) (1973). Nongsamei Puya. Imphal: Manipur Stationery and Printing Industries. Singh, T. M. (1967). Manipurda nongchuplomgi sikhya (Western education in Manipur). Vol.1. Imphal: Churachand Printing Works. Singh, R. K. S. (1985). Pangal Thorakpa. Imphal: Liberty Publication Association.

Appendix Table 4.5  Enrolment of minority communities in higher education (2012–2018) State Manipur 2012–13 2013–14 2014–15 2015–16 2016–17 2017–18

Muslim Male 1,123 2,218 2,076 1,957 1,696 2,548

Female 1,094 1,881 1,547 1,589 1,833 2,336

Other Minority Communities Total 2,217 4,099 3,623 3,546 3,529 4,884

Male 361 6,364 2,044 2,115 2,793 3,046

Female 401 7,689 1,832 1,768 2,722 3,126

Source: All India Survey on Higher Education (2017–2018).

Total 762 14,053 3,876 3,883 5,515 6,172

110  Chingiz Khan Table 4.6  Muslim and Meitei OBC students in the affiliated colleges in Manipur University (2017–2018) Class

Graduate Postgraduate Diploma

Muslim OBC

Meitei OBC

Male

Female

Total

Male

Female

Total

2,154 15 33

1,772 13 12

3,926 28 45

6,148 170 143

7,513 263 80

13,661 433 223

Source: http://www.manipuruniv.ac.in/p/students-statistics-4 (accessed 15 February 2020).

Part III

Youth, urban marginality and education A contested terrain

5 Education, youth and labour market A case of urban marginalities Naomi Prachi Hazarika

Urban marginalities, a term borrowed from Loïc Wacquant (1993), are the margins of all that a city represents, including development, social mobility and wealth. They are dwelling spaces for “cheap” labour who provide services which the city requires. The creation of urban marginalities takes place because of the indispensability of the urban poor population and their services, thus catering to their need to be housed somewhere. In this way, the process of urbanisation itself creates the physical space of the urban marginalities, which often get the short end of any development bargain promised by the city, leading to the ghettoisation of populations. Through this creation of the ‘other,’ urban marginality is a process related to the rise of the developed, rich core of the ‘global’ urban city. While it may mean economic and social mobility for this certain class in the urban ‘core,’ it means stagnation and humiliation for the ‘other.’ Today’s urban space is not only an important site of rapid transformation but a site of social discrimination and socio-economic disparities. The creation of an ‘urban margin’ is a complex socio-spatial process, simultaneous to the creation of an urban metropolitan core, and it poses unique challenges to social policy that is attempting to realise normative objectives, including education, which is intrinsic to developing human capabilities. Education is also an arena of citizens’ aspirations, because it offers the possibility of social mobility, thereby challenging entrenched inequalities. An understanding of the urban margins manifested in the form of slums, unauthorised colonies and jhuggi-jhopdi (slum) clusters, as geographical spaces that house individuals who are most often migrants, allows us to probe the question of the multidimensional deprivations that they suffer in addition to class and caste, which thereby constitutes their marginalised status. This marginalisation also accrues from the space that they inhabit within the city, and the land where they reside, as they negotiate their rights and freedoms as urban citizens. It represents how lived experiences from a slum in the city would differ wildly from those of a posh residential enclave. These differences in the way we live involve how we claim our rights to basic amenities such as health, education or sanitation that are constitutive of the aims of social policy.

114  Naomi Prachi Hazarika Urban citizenship is inequitable in nature precisely because everyone has different degrees of access and claims to social policy and welfare. While a certain section of the population, which enjoys a privileged position in society, can negotiate these claims of welfare within the city, another section, which forms a majority in the city, may be unable to do the same. Moreover, the fact that individuals from the socially disadvantaged working class are often spatially ghettoised in pockets of the city raise pertinent questions on whether they have access to pathways out of these spaces, to achieve upward mobility. Therefore, in this context, education plays an essential role in providing the ladder required to achieve social and upward mobility. Especially in the case of the urban margins where ghettoisation takes place, studying the role of education in helping individuals secure a way out and achieve upward mobility becomes a central issue. Thus, it is of vital importance that we interrogate and study whether equitable access to quality education for individuals living in the margins of the city is possible or not. In this pursuit, studying educational aspirations is one way of providing deep insights into the lives of students who reside in urban marginal spaces, as they navigate their lives. Moreover, in a city such as Delhi, where the state government has taken concrete steps to reform the education system in the region and has allocated the largest proportion of its aggregate expenditure to education, at 22.8 per cent (Reserve Bank of India, State Budget Analysis Report 2017), which is the highest among all of the states in the country, it becomes equally important to see whether or not such reforms have benefitted each child equally. The Delhi government has implemented many commendable policies, such as establishing School Management Committees under the Right to Education Act 2009, conducting parent-teacher meetings, introducing a ‘Happiness’ curriculum in schools and establishing ‘Educational and Vocational Training Counselors’ (EVGC) in Delhi Government schools. However, since within every city there exist pockets of poverty and marginality, it is essential to see how and if such reforms have panned out in places where the most vulnerable populations of the city reside. In these spaces of marginality within the city, the dynamics of both education and the corresponding pathways to the labour market differ from those in the spaces of more affluent localities within the city. This is especially so in the current context, wherein throughout the country, as found in Sanjay Kumar’s (2019) recent study, only a small fraction of Indian youth is employed in decent, well-paying professional jobs. If this is the national scenario, what is the situation in the pockets of poverty that exist within major cities, which house the urban poor? Moreover, the geographical concentrations of the working class and the informal economy within slums or other such spaces of urban marginality do not inherently form the crux of the problem as much as the lack of mobility is within these spaces. Empirical evidence supports the claim made by multiple scholars that for as long as two decades, there has been no change in the nature of employment for

Education, youth and labour market  115 people living in slums (Ramachandran & Subramanian, 2001), and that, in many Indian cities, the upward mobility of migrants who stay for longer durations remains limited (Mitra, 2016). The question is: what keeps individuals from urban margins stuck in places of marginality? In a time where precariousness can be found across contexts, making it more and more difficult to secure employment, how are the youth living in spaces of urban marginalities imagining the future and aspiring for jobs? What are their educational aspirations? What range of jobs is available to them? How are they, if they are at all, accessing these jobs? What are the possible pathways that they use to gain access to these jobs? This chapter attempts to shed light on such questions. It maps the aspirations of youths aged 16–21 in Sangam Vihar, an unauthorised colony in the city of New Delhi, as they navigate pathways towards higher education and the labour market. The chapter grounds itself in the question of whether geographical disadvantages overlap with educational aspirations and the post-school pathways available for students. The findings show how students use a combination of formal schooling, informal supplements and the shadow educational system to bridge the shortcomings they may incur in schools, when securing a job or pursuing higher education. Through ethnographic fieldwork conducted over a period of three months, this study situates itself in two sites in Sangam Vihar: an all-girl’s government–run school and a private spoken English-medium academy.

Study sites and methodology With a population of more than 4 lakh1 as of 2020, Sangam Vihar, Asia’s largest unauthorised colony,2 is located in the posh locality of South Delhi. It is spread over 5 square km, marked by the Mehrauli-Badarpur road to the north, the Asola Wildlife Sanctuary to the south, and the three villages of Tigri, Deoli and Khanpur to the west. Sangam Vihar consists of two Delhi State Legislative Assembly constituencies, namely Sangam Vihar (number 49) and Deoli (number 47). Sangam Vihar has two members of the Legislative Assembly and five municipal councillors. Categorised as an unauthorised colony (UAC) by the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), it was ‘built on land not included in the development area in the plan or built on land within the developmental area but not yet zoned for residential use’ (Bhan, 2016: 60). According to the Delhi Development Authority (DDA), an unauthorised colony is a ‘a colony/development comprising of contiguous area, where no permission of concerned agency has been obtained for approval of Layout Plan, and/or building plan’ (cited in Bhan 2016: 62). The literature on unauthorised colonies identifies two features that are characteristic of these spaces (Sheikh & Banda, 2016); first, unauthorised colonies tend to be on land that was originally zoned as non-residential, according to the Master Plans (such as for agricultural use), and later subdivided into plots. Second, when people bought or sold the land, it was done with documentation that residents can produce when

116  Naomi Prachi Hazarika asked for. Another characteristic feature of unauthorised colonies is that they are highly heterogeneous spaces, housing both working class and middle-income families (Bhan, 2013: 61). This heterogeneity can be seen in the variety of structures built within these spaces, where housing ranges from temporary shacks to tiled, multistoried bungalows. Even though Sangam Vihar refers to a single UAC, it is made up of numerous blocks that are also categorised as unauthorised colonies. What we see as Sangam Vihar today is a collection of smaller UACs that have developed over a period of four decades, making it the largest agglomeration of UACs in the city. Some of these blocks themselves have further divisions (Block J, J1, J2 and so on) and have applied for regularisation. The literature reports that Sangam Vihar came into existence around 1979– 1980 and was originally agricultural land belonging to four villages, namely Tigri, Deoli, Tughlaqabad and Khanpur (Sheikh & Banda, 2016: 144–415). The land was originally owned by Jat and Gujjar communities, who sold the plots to migrants who came to the city in search of work and needed affordable housing. These migrants were reportedly mostly labourers, who came from states such as Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan and Bihar to work in preparation for the Asian Games held in 1982 or to work in the Okhla Industrial Area situated nearby (Vedeld & Siddham, 2002: 6). The density of residential units within Sangam Vihar is high and stands in stark contrast to the neighbouring elite residential colony of Sainik Farms. The reason behind choosing Sangam Vihar as the primary site for this study is that, as opposed to being located on the periphery of the city, it is located in the prime location of South Delhi and thus presents a complicated picture of urban marginality Education in Sangam Vihar There are six government schools currently functional in Sangam Vihar. In addition, a large number of private unaided schools are operational in Sangam Vihar, along with many private, unrecognised schools. According to a recent study conducted by the Hindustan Times, ‘most of the schools in Sangam Vihar are low-cost private schools these low-cost private schools have as many as 50 students in each class and employ untrained contractual teachers who do not possess the requisite professional degrees in order to teach’ (Kausar & Kinu, 2018). However, the demand for these small English-medium, low-cost, private/-unaided and, often, unrecognised schools is high amongst parents in Sangam Vihar, because of the fact that they are English-medium schools or at least claim to be so on paper. In the year 2015–2016, only 75 schools out of 1,009 Delhi Government schools were listed as English-medium (Kausar & Kinu, 2018). The lack of good-quality English-medium government schools has contributed to the demand for these low-cost private schools, which aim to provide what government schools have not been able to offer.

Education, youth and labour market  117 Sangam Vihar also has an expanded shadow education system, ranging from private tuition centers to private spoken English academies. Walking through the narrow lanes of Sangam Vihar, one notices that every second shop is advertised as providing tuition classes, study centers and spoken English classes. There is documented evidence on the demand for tuition classes and out of school classes in the context of urban marginalities (Agarwal & Chugh, 2003). The growth of these tuition centers is a direct manifestation of the growing perception on the part of Sangam Vihar residents, who place a significant importance on the value of education. There is a general awareness that government schools do not provide good-quality education and often do not have enough teachers, while not everyone can afford to send their child to a private English-medium school, either. The most popular solution is, therefore, to send children to the government school nearby and supplement that education with private tutoring classes. In the case of Sangam Vihar, as field observations show, not only do parents send their children for private tutoring as early as Class II, students of Classes IX and above offer private tutoring classes themselves to younger students. This study was conducted at two sites of Sangam Vihar: a government girl’s school and a private spoken English academy.

Site I: all-girl’s senior secondary government school, Sangam Vihar The first site selected for this study is an all-girls senior secondary government school in Sangam Vihar. Run by the Delhi Government, under the Directorate of Education, it has two shifts: morning for girls and evening for boys. The girls’ shift is from 7 am to 12 noon, following which the boys’ shift begins. The school has upper primary, secondary and higher secondary sections, from Class VI to Class XII. However, the choice of streams available for Classes XI and XII is limited to arts and commerce. The primary medium of instruction is Hindi, but one section from each class (typically section A) is an English-medium class, taught by teachers from a non-governmental organization (NGO). Of the total 145 teachers currently working in the school, 120 work on a contractual basis; only 25 are permanent, regular teachers. The pupil–teacher ratio for the year 2016–2017 was 45. According to the School Report Card 2016–17 (National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration, 2016), 6,523 girls were enrolled for the 2016–2017 school year. However, the report indicates that the school has only 66 functional rooms available for teaching. As a result, the student–classroom ratio is a staggering 99 students to one classroom. Even though the girls’ school has more than 6,000 students, there are only 11 functional computers for them to use. Thus, while the school infrastructure is in good working order, it falls short in addressing the needs of the large population enrolled.

118  Naomi Prachi Hazarika ‘English medium’: the role of a non-governmental organisation in a government school As an NGO that trains a cohort of ‘fellows’ under a Fellowship who work as full-time teachers in over 209 government schools catering to low-income communities across the country is in-charge of teaching the English medium sections of each class in this government school. At the girls’ school under study in Sangam Vihar, the teaching team has six ‘fellows,’ all female, who are in charge of teaching all subjects for Section A of all classes, from Class VI to Class X. This means that they cater to a total of 5 cohorts, teaching subjects such as English, science, mathematics and social sciences. Admission to an English-medium class taught by a fellow requires students to pass a scaffolding test that involves reading comprehension in English. At the moment, the current batch of students in Class X are the first to have been taught by the fellows when they joined the school, in Class VI. Apart from teaching within school hours, the fellows also run a learning centre in Sangam Vihar after school. The center is used for conducting mathematics bridge classes, vocabulary and spoken English classes, amongst many others. The fellows also arrange for occasional career counselling sessions for the students. I began this study by observing each of the English-medium classrooms and events held at the after-school learning center, to understand the learning methods and pedagogical innovations. My participant observation was supplemented by in-depth interviews with all the fellows currently engaged with the school, as well as the principal, to identify issues with regard to accessing and completing school education in Sangam Vihar. I employed ‘go-alongs,’ which are often used as an ethnographic research tool to study street phenomenology (Kusenbach, 2003) for this aspect of the study. The go-along method involves following people into their familiar environments and tracking the outings they usually make, as closely as possible. The go-along method is useful, because people do not usually comment on what is going on while they are in their natural environments. For instance, in interviews, the informant leaves what he or she is doing to sit down and narrate their story. Thus, there is a significant disconnect from the natural environment they are in to the formal sit-down interview. Methods such as that of interviews or those restricted only to participant observation may, therefore, miss crucial aspects of the lived experience. For the purpose of this study, I relied on go-alongs with teachers and students to investigate the socio-economic and cultural contexts, and I accompanied them on home-visits to meet the students’ parents.

Site II: private spoken English academy The private spoken English academy under discussion is a charitable organisation, funded by a company based in the United States of America. The

Education, youth and labour market  119 branch in Sangam Vihar is one of many that operate in multiple cities of India. The course it provides are offered to students completely free of charge. Students attend one hour and forty-minute class six days a week for approximately a year. The classroom is located on the first floor and basement of a private building that has been rented out. The first-floor classroom acts as both a computer centre, with 20 laptops with headsets, and as a space for facilitators to convene when required. Four teachers or facilitators are placed at this branch, two for the morning sessions, stretching from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., and two for the evening session, from 2 p.m. to 9 p.m. In total, 16 sessions are held every day, with eight classes in the morning and eight in the evening. Each session is divided equally between facilitators, who teach four classes per day. All four facilitators at this academy were previously students in the same program, who then qualified for the teacher-training program. Prospective students who want to enroll in the program are initially observed for seven days, as they participate in various learning activities. During this period, facilitators look for self-motivation and a willingness to learn. Subsequently, students take a test, based on which they are assigned a particular level of proficiency and allotted a certain ‘book,’ ranging from Book 1 to Book 5. A facilitator explained that most of the students studying at this branch are school-going children, with the exception of a few working professionals who attend classes in the late evening. The classroom observation lasted for two months, where I attended classes and took part as a student. This was supplemented by in-depth interviews.

Discussion Site I Pedagogy: how is learning taking place? The classroom for standard X was jam-packed, with more than 50 girls waiting for the teacher to arrive for English class. Soon the teaching fellow entered, and all the girls stood up to greet her. The lesson began with the narration of a story called ‘Madam Rides the Bus,’ by Vallikkannan, which revolves around an eight-year-old girl’s first bus-ride into the world outside her village. The teacher’s pedagogical practices stood in stark contrast to those of any other class one might have been to. Instead of pin-drop silence, the teacher encouraged the students, who were divided into groups, to speak up and elicited answers from them throughout the class. Similarly, the teacher frequently asked students to help one another by discussing their understanding of the story, and then she asked one student from each group to speak about what was discussed. If the students started to speak amongst themselves for a little longer than required, the teacher would ask

120  Naomi Prachi Hazarika them to clap twice if they could hear her. This immediately helped the class to refocus their attention on the teacher. Throughout the class, the teacher kept moving around the classroom, from one table to another, and did not use the raised platform meant for the teacher to stand on unless she had to write something on the blackboard. This meant that she could see what each and every child was doing and keep a check on their progress with the lesson. The classroom for Standard VI is arranged in a manner that allows students to speak to one another and discuss the class. Eight pairs of tables are arranged so that each table faces another. When the mathematics class began, the teacher asked the ‘tablet’ monitor to distribute a tablet to each student. The tablet monitor went from table to table, distributing the allocated electronic tablets. As the class began, each child had the tablets in front of them on the table. They read the questions on the screen and solved them in their notebooks. The screen had questions followed by four options out of which the student had to click on the correct option, after they had solved the question. Students were allowed to talk to each other while they solved their questions; they raised their hands if they had trouble with any question. The teacher sat in front of the class, facing the students, as she checked the real-time results of each child’s test. As soon as a child clicked on an option as the answer, the teacher could track the result on her laptop immediately. If many students remained stuck on one particular question, the teacher then told everyone to stop solving it while she demonstrated the concept behind that question on the board. After class, I interacted with Kanika, the fellow who was teaching mathematics and asked her how the tablets worked. She informed me that the tablets were gifted by another NGO and helped her keep track of each student. Each student had questions tailored to her own learning levels. If a child is a high scorer in Mathematics, she will be solving a question paper that has harder questions as compared to someone who has low scores. The idea is to have a differentiated teaching process tailored to each student’s own learning abilities. Kanika, Fellow, government school (5/12/18) However, access to technology of this kind was limited to the classes taught by fellows. The rest of the school, roughly 90 per cent of the student body, was sharing the 11 computers that were available in the school. Therefore, language is not the only factor that differentiates Section A from the rest of the school, which has Hindi as the medium of instruction. There are, in fact, different pedagogical practices, uses of technology, extracurricular activities and out of school learning opportunities for students enrolled in the classes taught by fellows. However, the entry procedure itself for the

Education, youth and labour market  121 English-medium classes requires students to pass a test, which means not every child has an equal opportunity to study in English-medium classrooms. Aspirations and roadmaps: desires and possibilities Everyone has aspirations, but they don’t have the roadmap towards achieving them. Fellow, Sangam Vihar The principal of the school reported that she often meets her students at a nearby mall, where they work part-time. On being asked about the top students at the school, she said some of them come back to teach in the school after graduation. Most of the teachers that I spoke to claimed that even though students had the required initiative, they did not have a corresponding road map towards achieving their aspirations. Reena is one such student, who wants to apply to a school associated with the international baccalaureate board for Classes XI and XII but does not know how to go about it. Another student, Shanti, wants to become an actress but realises that not only does she have no knowledge of how to do so, but that acting as a profession might not be possible for her. Fatima, one of the fellows teaching in the school, said many of the girls in her class want to become make-up artists and open salons. While some want to continue studying after school, most of the students want to go to work as soon as possible, to contribute financially to the family. Commonly, however, students often brought up the lack of clarity as a problem, when asked about their future plans and how to achieve them. Fatima also mentioned that there was a lack of contextual role models for students to look up to. Their ‘aspirations window’ is influenced by the fact that there are very few individuals to be found in different professions. Aspirations seem to be of two kinds: desires and possibilities. The latter are grounded in the contextual realities of Sangam Vihar, which is telling, in terms of understanding the range of options open to students after they complete school. The school does not have a counsellor but, as I was informed by the principal, there is a ‘career counselling mela’ held once every year for Class XI and Class XII. Although the NGO that trains fellows also holds career-counselling sessions for students in the English-medium classes, the majority of the school remains outside the reach of a systematic counselling system. The limited range of options available, as indicated by the students, is not because of a lack of skills but rather, results from a significant gap in providing the requisite information and counselling, at the right time. According to the principal, the top students in each batch could be admitted to colleges at the University of Delhi, such as Kamla Nehru College and Gargi College. However, the principal added, there are certain limitations

122  Naomi Prachi Hazarika on parents, as well. Parents are reluctant to send their children outside of Sangam Vihar for higher education, due to the cost and the distance. As field estimates show, after finishing school education, students tend to pursue higher education through distance learning or open learning, instead of the regular mode. In the context of urban marginalities such as Sangam Vihar, as Krishna (2013) finds, there is a lack of institutional support, which he calls ‘multiple institutional disconnections’, which thereby limits the range of resources available within the people’s networks. This limitation ultimately results in individuals being thrown back upon social networks and personal resources, as they face a low glass ceiling, in terms of their career prospects (2013: 1022). Being exposed to the glitz and glory of the city, individuals from spaces of urban marginalities find themselves without the institutional and structural mechanism to bridge the gap between what they aspire to and what they can eventually achieve. This raises the question: how does one build institutional connections? One way could be to ensure an institutionally guaranteed network of information for students. Allowing for a support structure to exist that provides sufficient career guidance and vocational training might be one ways to undo these institutional disconnections. As Krishna (2013: 29) argues, ‘structural explanations show how a divide has come to exist in the context of urban marginalities, but a complementary institutional explanation is important to understand why individuals fail to get across the divide in sufficient numbers.’ Additionally, students and parents recognise English as the language of the marketplace and a key factor in ensuring access to jobs. The allure of private schools continues to exist in Sangam Vihar because of the promise of English-medium education, for which parents are ready to spend large amounts of money. Even as I walked through the corridors of the school, the enthusiasm with which students would come up to me and speak to me in English showed a desire to learn the language become fluent in it. This explains the growing number of private spoken English classes in Sangam Vihar, which fill a gap the government schools have been unable to bridge, by providing good-quality English classes. The Aam Aadmi Party, holding office in the government of Delhi, did introduce spoken English classes, in order to ‘enhance the spoken English skills of the students in Delhi Government schools’ (Directorate of Education, 2018). This pilot project started in 2018, in collaboration with MacMillan Publishers India Pvt. Ltd. and the British Council, where students enrolled in Class XI are provided with a course for 180 hours spread over 28–30 days. However, even with this flagship program in place, why do students in Sangam Vihar prefer to go to private spoken English classes? This is discussed further in the next section.

Site II As one enters Sangam Vihar, about a kilometre into the colony, a variety of shops are lined up on both sides, ranging from hardware and provisions

Education, youth and labour market  123 shops to private academies that provide spoken English classes. The frequency of these private academies intensifies as and when one walks further into the colony. The very existence of these private agencies offering spoken English classes reflect an important social reality of Sangam Vihar. This prompted an inquiry into where, why and how the demand for these classes arose. Understanding this as a research question is important because, in the context of urban marginalities in a rapidly developing country such India, as the literature shows, the acquisition of the English language has a transformative role, which shapes aspirations and accomplishes upward social mobility. For example, Jayadeva’s (2019: 1) research on English-medium schooling and social mobility in Bangalore analyses the ‘transformative potential of English-medium education vis a vis people’s experiences of this education in urban India.’ She recognises the role of English in providing a crucial vehicle for socio-economic mobility. However, she also argues that this reproduces existing inequalities, apart from creating new ones. She further says that a person’s ability to speak English, and the kind of English that they use, was experienced as ‘shaping significantly how they viewed and treated by others’ in many spaces and contexts of the city. English was also placed symbolically within the urban imagination, acting as a major aspirational node. The agencies that provide out-of-school classes for spoken English point towards a tacit acknowledgment by people living in the margins about the importance of gaining the skill of speaking in English to access the city space. ‘Spoken English’ and ‘personality development’: insights from a spoken English class The class is physically arranged with a group of students around the teacher (called a facilitator, in this academy) in a semicircle as they begin. The teacher asks, ‘Do you know Michael Jackson?’ All the students know who he is, replying with answers such as, ‘He is a hip-hop dancer,’ or ‘He is a pop singer.’ The teacher then asks everyone to move to their respective laptops and watch a lyrical video of a song by Michael Jackson called ‘Man in the Mirror.’ He tells them that they must listen to the song through their headsets individually, to learn the lyrics, and then gather around him again to sing the song aloud together. Once all the students have listened to the song, they come back to their seats around the teacher. The teacher plays the song again with the lyrics on the screen of a laptop kept in the centre, so that everyone could see the lyrics and sing along. After finishing the song, the teacher asks the students to take out their books and answer the questions about the music video that they just watched in pairs of two. After 15 minutes, a discussion within the class follows on the question posed by the teacher, ‘What can we do to make the world a better place?’ The focus during the class is on two things: the message of the song and the pronunciation of words. At first, the class discusses how one can make

124  Naomi Prachi Hazarika the world a better place through maintaining clean homes and cities, as well as motivating others to do so. The teacher intervenes when a student makes a mistake in pronuncing a word. For example, the teacher corrects a student, ‘It is not aal the best, it is all the best.’ The audio-visual aids used for the classes range from Miley Cyrus songs and Ted Talks to inspirational clips from animated English movies and real-life stories. Through the exposure to English of this kind, whether in Michael Jacksons songs or Pixar’s animated movie, Up, the students learn how to speak in English. The English language is taught in almost all the schools that the students attend, so they know how to read and write in English. However, students are looking to pick up the confidence required to speak in English of a particular kind, through classes such as these. The reason why I joined this Academy is because it is not just for English but also for personality development. They teach us intonation and that builds our confidence which is not taught in schools. Schools only teach us English through textbooks. My main problem is of confidence, that is why I have come here. I know English but when I open my mouth, my voice trembles and nothing comes out. Neha, English academy (28/01/19) I want to improve my English. I got to know about this Academy through a friend and joined the classes last year. I want to speak in English because it is important for getting a good job these days. In school, there is nothing done for English. If I was taught from the beginning I would have been able to improve. But since I was in a private school till class 5th, I can still speak some English. Rohini, English academy (29/01/19) Thus, the importance was in speaking a certain kind of English, in a certain way that exuded ‘confidence.’ Learning English was not the end itself. Instead, the goal was to speak English ‘non-stop.’ The perception that students had was that even if the schools they attended taught them how to read and write the language, it was only through additional classes such as these that could learn how to speak English. Moreover, the English taught in school was said to be strictly textbook-based, and some students hardly follow them. There is, therefore, a significant demand for private spoken English classes, in order to make up for English classes that were not taught well in school. English as an aspirational node In the post-liberalisation era, we see the rise of elite and English-medium private schools that are often considered to be crucial in obtaining a ‘good’ job. Consequently, we also see a sharp divide in terms of the kind of ‘elite’

Education, youth and labour market  125 school culture that can be seen in our cities, which provide access to cultural and social capital to already privileged sections of the population. For example, when Waldrop (2004) asked parents who are in elite professions and in administrative positions in New Delhi to select schools where they would like to send their children, he found that the same five private schools were the most sought after. Thus, according to Waldrop (2004: 211–212), urban private schools are homogenous social arenas which enable the building up of social capital. The importance of social and cultural capital with regard to education has been studied by sociologists (Persell, 1981; Pianta & Walsh, 2014), who advance theories such as the cultural deficit model and the cultural difference theory (the inconsistency between the dominant middle-class culture at school and the working class/minority culture at home). Scholars such as Bernstein (1971), in his study of the role of language codes, and Bourdieu (1984), with his focus on the types of capital (cultural, social and economic) and how family strategies (or the lack thereof) manipulate these resources in order to pursue their children’s education, all highlight the sharp divide between the advantaged and disadvantaged sections of the population when it comes to education. Therefore, we also see the disadvantaged sections of urban society aspire to the same English-medium education in order to access good jobs, as the market has expanded to offer differentiated private schools, in terms of cost and quality (Nambissan, 2010). However, while the culture of coaching and private tutorials has permeated all classes of urban society and led to the mushrooming of a largely unregulated shadow education system, these institutions vary in quality. Therefore, as Majumdar (2017) argues in her study of Kolkata city schools, while aspirations are becoming increasingly similar across social classes in favour of private and shadow education, the opportunities for achieving these aspirations are structurally unequal. Previous studies on the English language in India have shown that English is often perceived by young Indians as having the ‘power to leverage them out of the disadvantaged class into elite professional and social classes’ (Vaish, 2008: 214). Similarly, Chand (2011: 7) argues that ‘non-elite Indians’ think of the English language as an international one, with the potential to ‘provide spatial, and hence economic mobility.’ A key takeaway from LaDousa’s (2007: 948) work on English- and Hindi-medium schools in India is how they ‘operate in different spheres that are conceptualised spatially.’ This distinction between the language used as the medium of instruction allows us to understand how language plays an important role and how this is overlaid upon existing social distinctions. Additionally, as LaDousa argues, the role of language is so important that it has its own ideological underpinnings and remains with the student even in higher education, in tags such as ‘Hindu-medium student’ or ‘English-medium student.’ The ideological underpinning and importance of language can be seen in the form of the thousands of private spoken English classes found in Sangam Vihar. Sangam Vihar is lined with spoken English classes and private academies promising ‘American accents’ and ‘personality development.’ The demand for these

126  Naomi Prachi Hazarika classes was evident as students expressed the poor quality of teaching when it came to English education in school. Mahesh, the owner of one of these spoken English classes, says that schools do not focus on teaching English at all. According to him, English is an international language and plays an important part in securing employment. Yash, a teacher at the English academy, felt that an important reason why students came to these classes was to ensure that they could learn conversational English of a certain kind that is necessary for them to get ‘good jobs.’ The common understanding echoed by each student who came to the academy to learn how to speak English was the fact that they required this skill to ensure that they would have access to good jobs. English is seen as the vehicle for social and upward mobility, a chance to access the city as well as take part in the processes of the city through the labour market. For these students, speaking English opens up not only the doors of the city, but a world of possibilities. In the age of social media, every child has a Facebook, Instagram and Twitter account; but all these platforms are in English. Students wish to be fluent in the world that they are in, and perceive acquiring English skills as one way through which they can aspire to a better future. English toh international language hai. Agar English mein bolna nahi jaante toh aap good for nothing ho. College mein bhi jabh bacha jaata hai, wahan bhi English mein baat hoti hai. (English is an international language. If you don’t know how to speak in English, then you are good for nothing. When a child goes to college, people speak in English there as well.) Mohit, owner of a spoken English academy in Sangam Vihar (15/12/18) Classes that provide spoken English lessons, such as that of the English academy, act as support structures that provide students with the necessary skill of speaking English, something that schools are not being able to provide either inside or outside the classroom, through temporary schemes such as the spoken English classes introduced by the government, which are restricted to Class XI. Whether at the government school in Sangam Vihar or a low-cost private English-medium school, students still find the need to go to these spoken English classes in order to learn how to speak in English. This is because of issues such as the quality of English being taught in schools, as well as the fact that private spoken English classes work as a link between students and the labour market. These spoken English classes are connected to hiring and recruiting agencies located in and around the city, who are looking for students or graduates willing to work in call-centers and as delivery agents. These professions require a basic minimum ability to speak in English and offer a reasonable wage rate (Rs 20,000–Rs 35,000), with added perks such as cab pick-up and drop-off services. Hence, through these spoken English classes, students are able to learn both the language that they need to speak in order to access avenues in

Education, youth and labour market  127 the city and the language required for them to get a ‘good’ job. Students are willing to opt out of the ‘regular’ mode of higher education and enroll themselves in distance-mode programs in order to continue studying in these private English classes while supporting their families by working at part-time jobs. The out-of-school vocational classes range from English classes to basic computer skill classes, thereby filling a gap that the formal educational structure has been unable to fill or at the very least, has been unable to provide access to in these spaces. Working as pathways that connect people to the labour market, these classes help them move towards what they consider to be good jobs and a better future. In this manner, spoken English classes act as a ladder to scale for upward mobility which enables the students to accomplish their aspirations.

Conclusion This chapter explores whether geographical disadvantages overlap with educational aspirations and the post-school pathways available for students. The importance of examining this issue falls in line with the policy focus in urban India that has emphasised social infrastructure and mobility, aiming to develop human and social capital through education. Our findings reveal that in the context of the first site of enquiry, the all-girls government school, two structural problems were observed which act as an institutional disconnection and aggravate the deprivations that students face. The first is the lack of a ‘roadmap’ or the paucity of support structures such as counselling and career guidance that should ideally be provided to the students. The school does not have a counsellor, even though it caters to more than 6,000 students, who need guidance and career counselling. Engagement with the intervention of an NGO in providing English-medium education in the school revealed that there is a demonstrated demand to learn the language. However, since the school has only one English-medium section in each class, where English is the language of instruction, this demand is met by market forces in the form of the private spoken English classes that can be seen in every lane of Sangam Vihar. At the second site of enquiry, the private spoken English academy, insights from the classroom showed how the emphasis is on the ‘spoken’ aspect of the English language, as students attempt to undo the deficit they incur in their schools. The findings show students perceived the English language training in schools to be of a ‘textual’ kind and felt a need to learn how to speak in English in a certain manner that guarantees reward. Tracing the way in which English as a language acts as an aspirational node allows us to understand the important role it plays in accessing essential post-school aspirations, such as getting good jobs or gaining admission to colleges. The jobs available to students as a post-school option are of a certain kind pertaining to the service industry. Whether these are call-centres for multinational corporations or work as contractual teachers in small private schools in Sangam Vihar, these professions have low wages and are

128  Naomi Prachi Hazarika temporary in nature. Considering the empirical evidence provided by previous research pointing towards a geographical concentration of the working class within the city and a low upward mobility rate in these spaces, the question of why students from the urban margins are not able to access better jobs needs further investigation. With the rising unemployment rate in the country, the nature of informal jobs central to the urban economy and the rise of the gig economy, it is imperative that we ask: are these insecure jobs the only choice for a certain section of the population? These questions remain unanswered and should be considered as a potential site for further research. The crucial link between the illegality of land tenure, the informality of jobs and limited upward mobility within the context of the urban margins raises important and essential questions that deserve their own independent research studies to be better understood. With the recognition of the urban poor as an Under-Represented Group (URG) within the National Education Policy 2020 (Government of India, 2019), this study ends with the hope that through a fruitful convergence between contemporary urban and education policy, the promised development and a better future will be delivered to all.

Notes 1 Due to the lack of reliable data on the exact population of Sangam Vihar and the overlapping boundaries in Census data, the estimate is derived from the sum of the number of voters on the roll for the last State Assembly Elections held in 2020 in two constituencies: Deoli and Sangam Vihar. The data is provided by ‘Elections in India’ and stands at 4,25,769 voters. 2 At the time when fieldwork was conducted, Sangam Vihar was categorised as an ‘Unauthorised Colony.’ However, the Union Government of India recognised the disparities that exist in Unauthorised Colonies of the city of New Delhi and passed the ‘National Capital Territory of Delhi (Recognition of Property Rights of Residents in Unauthorised Colonies) Bill, 2019’ on the 28 November 2019. The Bill (Point 4, p. 4) reads, ‘In view of the socio-economic conditions of the residents of the unauthorised colonies and ground realities, it is desirable to recognise and confer rights of ownership or transfer or mortgage to the residents of such colonies on the basis of Power of Attorney, Agreement to Sale, Will, possession letter and other documents including documents evidencing payment of consideration and to facilitate development or re-development that may improve existing infrastructure, civic and social amenities which may lead to better quality of life.’ With this Bill, all the unauthorised colonies within Sangam Vihar will be granted regularisation with consultation of the Delhi Development Authority. What should follow is a subsequent upgrading of all social and civic amenities, including that of education. Whether the regularisation process brings with it positive changes, only time will tell.

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Education, youth and labour market  129 Bhan, G. (2013, June 15). Planned illegalities: Housing and the ‘failure’ of planning in Delhi: 1947–2010. Economic and Political Weekly, 58–70. Bhan, G. (2016). In the public’s interest: Evictions, citizenship, and inequality in contemporary Delhi (vol. 30). Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press. Chand, V. (2011). Elite positionings towards Hindi: Language policies, political stances and language competence in India. Journal of Sociolinguistics, 15(1), 6–35. Directorate of Education. (2018). 2015 and beyond: Delhi education revolution. New Delhi: Government of NCT. Government of India (2019). Draft national education policy 2019. (Dr Kasturirangan Committee Report). Retrieved May 3, 2020, from https://mhrd. gov.in/sites/upload_files/mhrd/files/Draft_NEP_2019_EN_Revised.pdf Jayadeva, S. (2019.) English-medium: Schooling, social mobility, and inequality in Bangalore, India. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 50(2), 151–169. Kausar, H., & Kinu, B. 2018. Class of 2018. The Hindustan Times, Retrieved from https://www.hindustantimes.com/class-of-2018/private-academy-for-boys-sarkari-schoolfor-girls.html Krishna, A. (2013). Stuck in place: Investigating social mobility in 14 Bangalore slums. The Journal of Development Studies, 49(7), 1010–1028. Kumar, S. (Ed.). (2019). Youth in India: Aspirations, attitudes, anxieties. Abingdon: Routledge. Kusenbach, M. (2003). Street phenomenology: The go-along as ethnographic research tool. Ethnography, 4(3), 455–485. LaDousa, C. (2007). Of nation and state: Language, school, and the reproduction of disparity in a North Indian City. Anthropological Quarterly, 80(4), 925–959. Majumdar, M. (2017) Homogenized educational imagination and polarized educational opportunities: Schooling in contemporary Kolkata. In W. T. Pink & G. W. Noblit (Eds.), Second international handbook of urban education (pp. 319–345). Cham: Springer. Mitra, I. K. (2016). Recycling the urban: Migration settlement and the question of labour in contemporary Kolkata. Economic & Political Weekly, 51(26/27), 55–62. Nambissan, G. B. (2010). The Indian middle classes and educational advantage: Family strategies and practices. In M. W. Apple, S. J. Ball, & L. A. Gandin (Eds.), The Routledge international handbook of the sociology of education (pp. 285– 295). London: Routledge & Francis Group. National Institute of Educational Planning and Administration (NIEPA). 2016. School report card 2016. Retrieved November 22, 2019, from http://schoolreportcards.in/SRC-New/. Persell, C. H. (1981). Genetic and cultural deficit theories: Two sides of the same racist coin. Journal of Black Studies, 12(1), 19–37. Pianta, R., & Walsh, D. (2014). High-risk children in schools: Constructing sustaining relationships. New York and London: Routledge. Ramachandran, H. & Subramanian, S. V. (2001). Slum household characteristics in Bangalore: A comparative analysis (1973 and 1992). In H. Schenk (Ed.), Living in India’s slums: A case study of Bangalore (pp. 65–88). New Delhi: Manohar Publishers Sheikh, S., & Banda, S. (2016). Unpacking the “Unauthorized Colony”: Policy, planning and everyday lives. In S. Chakravarty & R. Negi (Eds.), Space, planning

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6 Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries Heena Khari

This chapter examines the educational choices available to marginalised communities in an urban metropolitan city. With rapid structural changes taking place in the urban space, especially through extensive and intensive infrastructure development, the question arises of how marginal groups plan to invest or disinvest in education. Given the diverse educational choices and options in the urban space, this study seeks to explore how marginalised groups such as the Gujjars make use of available avenues for their socio-economic transformation. The Gujjars are an ethnic group who lived as a nomadic pastoral community spread across the north-western states of India for centuries. In recent years, however, a population of Gujjars has settled in and around the city. This group has a unique feature: even after living for years in the capital city, Delhi, they appear to retain their traditional way of life, calling their residential area a village, or Gujjar Gao. When asked why they do so, one respondent replied, ‘Sahron mai koi kisiko nahi janta par gaon mai har koi sab ko jante hain’ (Nobody knows anybody in cities, everybody knows everyone in the villages). In Gujjar villages, generally every resident has kinship ties with the others. This poses a sharp contrast to the urban modern liberal world, which promotes individualism, and where community culture becomes subsumed under modern culture. In these urban villages, the liberal and the traditional appear to exist in parallel, with a sense of community identity still going strong. The concept of an urban village is central to the present study. An urban village is identified as a ‘village in the city’ (Murray, 2004). The location of village enclaves within cities makes the categories ‘rural’ and ‘urban’ imprecise (Sheth, 2017). The case of the urban village in Delhi results from the official land survey of Delhi in 1908, which divided the land into the khasara (agricultural land) and aabaadi (residential land). The aabaadi land, exempted from tax payments, was marked by the survey officials with red thread and known as ‘laal Dora.’ From 1915 to 1951, 47 villages were incorporated into the urban fold, on land initially acquired for a presidential residence, a parliamentary building, universities and cantonment. In 1940, the land acquisition was for rehabilitation colonies and government housing. By 1950, the government took over both the khasra and the aaabadi lands. This displaced the settlement villagers in large numbers.

132  Heena Khari After 1951, with increasing awareness amongst the authorities and the villagers, only the khasara land was acquired and aabadi land remained intact. Later, this aabaadi land was designated as ‘urban village.’ However, after 1957, the MCD (Municipal Corporation of Delhi) and DDA (Delhi Development Authority) came into existence. They adopted a policy of non-interference in the laal dora land, which affected its integration into the city economy.1 DDAofficials believed that they were helping the villagers, by not interfering in the residential and infrastructural environment. But in reality, the outcome was that the villagers’ agricultural land was taken away from them, without any alternative means of earning a livelihood being provided. Deprived of their agricultural land and fields to graze cattle, the villagers established small shops and industries. Eventually, these urban villages became a site to provide cheap accommodation for the migrant labour (Sheth, 2017). A respondent explained the meaning of laal dora: ‘Lal Dora ka matlab hai ki riyashi ki permission hai, ye road choada nahi karenge, basement nhi bana sakte, lal dora ka main objective hai ki unka culture maintain rahe’ (The road cannot be expanded, we cannot build a basement, we can only make residences. The main objective of Lal Dora is to maintain the culture). Since arriving in Delhi, the Gujjars have become economically and politically powerful. However, despite their strong political position, mainstream Delhi residents consider them uneducated, uncouth and aggressive. This general perception of the community stems from stereotypes and a lack of in-depth knowledge about the community. One early instance of stereotyping this community is evident in the Criminal Tribes Act of 1871. Because the Gujjars had participated in a revolt in 1857, the British government labelled them a ‘criminal’ community’ (The Hindu, 2003). Despite the decades that have passed, however, the Gujjars continue to be stereotyped, and the stigma that began in the mid-nineteenth century continues to be associated with them. Specifically, the perception that Gujjars are not interested in education persists among people outside the community and, also, people within the community. However, if one goes beyond the stereotypes, important questions arise. For instance, which educational opportunities does the community have an access to, bearing in mind its social and political influence in the area? Further, how are these choices being made in an urban context and what are the factors influencing them? The roles played by that the state and by social inequalities, such as class and gender, in determining such choices also form an important concern. These and many other questions have propelled this study into its current form.

Conceptualising choices Education is often seen as a liberating force and a great equalizer in a society. In a capitalist world, education promises prosperity, economic strength and better life chances, thus making it an instrument for economic and social development (Schultz, 1988; Tilak, 2003). Hence, educational choices

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  133 are a means to strive for equality and freedom and, therefore, democracy. This makes the concept of choice crucial for the present study, which aims to uncover what choices are being made by given individuals, under what circumstances and constraints. A choice could be objective or subjective, forced or voluntary, individual or collective. This chapter explores whether educational choices among the Gujjars are made freely or are loaded with social, cultural and economic constraints, thus manifesting a dynamic interplay amongst culture, structure and agency. Recent studies on the factors affecting educational choices have shown the role of student interest (an interest-based perspective) (Vulperhorst et al., 2019), social- economic status (a socio-economic perspective) (Kosunen, 2020), parents’ perceptions of teaching and learning (Lahoti & Mukhopadhyay, 2020), policies, geographical factors (Gulosino & Yoon, 2020) and gender considerations (Bordón et al., 2020). Studies have shown that ‘differences in culture, race, ethnicity and political-legal and economic environments have a large impact on student choice’ (Qasim et al., 2020). The various theories of choice help in conceptualizing the concept of choice. The rational choice theory, for example, submits that all of an individual’s social actions are rational; however, the rationality behind the social action may vary (Coleman, 1990). It cannot always be understood through the economic paradigm of cost and benefit. Rather, it may be rooted in traditional/habitual actions, emotional considerations, normative constraints or social obligations. In accordance with this theory, an individual’s educational choices are rational, rather than being impulsive reactions. The cultural ecology theory (Ogbu, 2003) sets educational choices in the context of the society. It states that the societal structures play an important role in molding these seemingly ‘free’ choices. The ‘cultural ecology theory of academic disengagement’ (Ogbu, 2003) points towards two sets of factors responsible for the academic disengagement and performance of minority students. The first pertains to system forces and the second to community forces. System forces include societal structures, processes and arrangements, which act as barriers to the minority education endeavour. It identifies ‘societal arrangements that frame the minority education’ (Huffman, 2010: 68). Ogbu defines community forces as ‘the ways minorities interpret and respond to schooling … The beliefs and behaviour within the minority community regarding education that minority students bring to school’ (Ogbu, 2008: 13). In this context, Bourdieu’s (2002) ideas of cultural ethos and cultural capital become relevant for the topic under study. He explains cultural ethos as the disposition of parents and the community towards the accumulation of cultural capital. Cultural ethos determines whether parents will make an effort to invest the time, money and support needed for their children to acquire capital required for success in the educational sphere. This plays an important role in supporting or hindering an infdividual’s acquisition of cultural capital. Even the choice of subject under study and school can be affected by the cultural ethos of a family and, thus, of an individual. The research until now has focused on the choices of parents, children and society, to see how

134  Heena Khari these choices are elucidated by rational choice theory. Ogbu’s theory of social ecology and the Bourdieuian concept of cultural ethos also help to explain how an individual’s choices are not made in a vacuum but are deeply affected by the social context and a rational calculation of the affordability and possible returns of an investment in education. In this chapter, an attempt is made to understand the sociocultural, economic and personal context of the choices being made by the Gujjars in the urban villages of Delhi.

Study design The study at hand is an ethnographic study based on intensive fieldwork in the urban village of Mandawali of Delhi, undertaken in order to understand the changing educational choices of members of the Gujjar community. It employed a variety of tools for collecting data, ranging from in-depth interviews to questionnaires and observation of the individuals in a family setting, in order to understand the values, role, aspirations and power dynamics of the family. A method of oral history was employed to explore migration and settlement patterns. Intensive fieldwork was carried out for 45 days in the village, from July 2018 to September 2018. In-depth interviews with 11 individuals were conducted in Mandawali. Each interview required approximately 8 to 10 hours, stretched over the course of two to three days. Fieldwork was again conducted in November 2018, to fill in gaps in the information left in the previous fieldwork and to collect additional data. Deploying an ethnographic method to conduct detailed interviews with a semi-structured interview schedule enabled the researcher to generate narratives to describe the complexity of the educational choices of the respondents. The study acquired an in-depth understanding of the urban village (field) and families (respondents), in a historical spatial perspective. The researcher made an attempt to collect quantitative demographic data on age, gender, fertility, mortality, educational qualifications, source of family income, etc. This data was collected in order to understand educational trends in the village. The researcher mapped the demographic information from the field covering around three generations, which helped in understanding the changing trends in the educational achievement of the urban Gujjars and also in finding the structural factors affecting their educational choices. The respondents were chosen according to the non-probability purposive sampling method, with the overall aim to ensure that the sampling design reflected the diverse population and included different gotras, as well as families who have made different choices about education and consequent employment. The researcher also used the method of kinship-mapping and tracing family trees, to trace the relationship between educational choices, changing circumstances and the cultural ethos of the family. This helps in ‘sorting the strange and irregular facts into the regular and orderly categories’ (Geertz, 1988). The process of selecting the respondents included an identification of the kunbas (clans) in the village selected for the study. Kunba, or lineage, ‘consists of persons who can indicate, by stating all

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  135 the intermediate links, common descent from a shared ancestor or ancestress’ (Fox, 1983). This means that all members of the lineage trace their common ancestry to a single person. After identifying the village kunbas, the researcher identified one family from each kunba. The researcher then interviewed the family selected, to obtain insight into their perceptions and thoughts on the educational choices of their family members. Information on the other members of the kunba was also sought from the respondent. In fact, with the help of the respondents’ family members, the researcher attempted to trace the kunba’s complete lineage. This included demographic information about the lineage groups and their educational choices, in order to arrive at general trends. In Mandawali, 11 kunbas were identified. Among the families selected for this study, living members of all generations (that were interviewed, in order to understand the changes in choices across generations.

Setting the trends in educational choices History of the Mandawali village Mandawali, or Mandawali Fazalpur, is located in east Delhi. The total area of Mandawali is 1,207.36 acres. Several respondents recall how the village has changed over the years. One respondent said, ‘Mandawali pahle se hi basa hua hai, ye area pahle Merrut mai tha, Dedha gotra ka, kuch Nagar aa gae trigaam se samvat 2005 mai. Mandawali gaon mai Dedha, Nagar, Bhati, Maavi ke 450 parivar hai’ (Mandawali was always there, the area was in Meerut before. Some families came in 2005. At present Mandawali is inhabited by 450 families belonging to the clans of Dedha, Nagar, Bhati and Mavi). No one remembers exactly when the Gujjars moved in the village. According to the respondents, the village is about 200 to 300 years old. Previously, it had been inhabited by Muslims, but afterwards Gujjar started residing there. This led to the change in name, from Fazalpur to Mandawali Fazalpur. One respondent shared the story behind the name of the Mandawlai village, saying, ‘Pahle ye musalmano ka gaon tha Fazalpur. Fir maar kaat ke baad musalmaan chale gaye. Goan mai ek baba tha. Uska naam tha Mandaw. Uske naam pe gaon ka naam Mandawali rakh diya gaya’ (The area was inhabited by Muslims and was called Fazalpur. They left after communal violence. The village was named Mandawali, after a Baba called Mandaw). Earlier, Mandawali had been part of Meerut. In 1911, it became part of Delhi. The respondents detailed how the village has changed over the years. They reminisce about the ‘simpler’ life in the past. One respondent recalls that ‘1950 ke samya pakke ghar nahi thai. Pura gaon dudh aur kheti baadi ka kaam karta tha. Sab Delhi main dudh bechne jaate thai’ (There were no brick houses in 1950s, the entire village worked in dairy or agriculture. Everyone used to go and sell milk in Delhi). Another respondent recalls, ‘Ye log dudha bechte thai. Doodh Chandni chok mai matkio mai jata tha.

136  Heena Khari Tab koi transportation to tha nahi to boat mai jaata tha dudh Delhi’ (These people sell milk. They used to send milk to Chandni Chowk in earthen pots. There was no transportation at that point, the milk used to be transported in boats). Rajeshwari recalls that when she came after her marriage to the village, ‘Pahle ye gaon pura kikaar tha’ (the village was barren). In 1952, only five houses were pakka, belonging to Bhikkan, Ragbeer, Krishan lal and Isha Pandit; the rest of the houses were kachaa houses. The houses were made up of clay made of soil mixed with cow dung. There were very few houses in the village. The main occupations in the village were agriculture and selling milk. Villagers supplied milk to the shops in Chandni Chowk (Delhi), the old Delhi Railway Station and Darya Ganj. They commuted to these places by boat. Along with selling milk, the villagers were occupied in agriculture. They had total of 35 bigha land, including land in the adjoining areas Preet Vihar, Madhuban and Anand Vihar before the implementation of the Land Acquisition Act. But the scenario changed after 1960. Under the Land Acquisition Policy, the MCD acquired and compensated the people for their land. According to one respondent, the land was acquired in three phases. In 1965, the villagers were given Rs 750/sq. yard, Rs 1,500/sq. yard or Rs 2,300/sq. yard, depending on the type and usage of the land.2 In the second and third phases, in 1971–1972, they were given Rs 8,500/sq. yard for their agricultural land, which was taken by the government for development and the construction of railways, housing, etc. Most of the villagers were uneducated and unable to see the long-term consequences on future generations of such an exchange. Their source of livelihood – agricultural land, the fields and farms – had been taken away from them for a pittance and were resold at a huge profit to companies. A respondent explained, ‘Na job mila. Jo plot allot hua vo bhi nahi mila sarkar 1000 gaj leti hai aur sarkar itna bhi nahi deti ki usse 100 gaj jameen kareedi ja sake’ (We didn’t get jobs. We also did not get the plot that was alloted to us. The government took away 1,000 acres and gave back money which was not even enough to buy even 100 acres). Another respondent complained, ‘Jo development ho rahi hai vo posh colony ki ho rahi hai, humare yaha kuch nahi ho raha’ (Only posh colonies are witnessing development, nothing is happening here). The DDA paid no attention towards generating alternative means of livelihood for the community. A respondent explained that today, only five to seven houses fall under laal dora, while the rest of the village is outside it. There are about 500 families in Mandawali, a population of about 5,000 people. The population has increased, but the laal dora has remained the same. These villagers are ‘confined as it were by the Red line both in the literal and figurative sense, the laal dora has got reduced to cramped, unhealthy pockets, lacking largely even in the basic civic services’ (Shrivastav, 2007).

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  137 The second shock that the village received was the ban on cattle rearing imposed by the Municipal Corporation in 1977. The word Gujjars is derived from goa chalak (cow-rearing), which the Gujjar community has traditionally been associated with. Everyone in the village had cow/buffalo. Milk is an important component of the Gujjar diet. According to a respondent, ‘Milk and yoghurt flowed more freely than water, and pitchers of ghee were full.’ As a part of the culture, and a source of income, many families sell their milk in markets or supply it to nearby households. The government policy to ban cattle in the city negatively impacted their source of income. In 1974, the Mother Dairy, the biggest plant for the collection and supplying of milk and milk products, was set up near Mandawali, in Patparganj. The puzzling question is why and how the Delhi government allowed big companies to set up a dairy plant, while refusing the same for individual members of the community. Was it a move intended to destroy the local milk market and to establish the Mother Dairy under Operation Flood? The respondents described how they suffered the loss of capital and income due to the government policy, which promoted a company while being insensitive towards the needs of traditional workers in the field. Some people had 200 buffalo, and the impact of the policy was that they had to sell them for a pittance. According to DDA officials, the villagers were allotted land for dairy production on the outskirts of Delhi. However, a respondent stated that this land was located 50 km from their residence. That is not feasible for the daily commuting required for a milk business. Cattle-rearing is not a part-time job. You have to feed buffaloes, fetch milk twice a day and spend time taking care of the buffaloes. Since these alternative plots were so far away, no one took them. The Mandawali village started changing after the 1960s, with the advent of urbanisation and development in the surrounding areas. The migration of people into the village started bringing about changes in the day-to-day life activities of the villagers. At present, there is nothing like a traditional village in Mandawali. The housing has changed, from kaccha houses to multistoried buildings. The self-subsistence economy of agriculture and dairy has changed to an urban rental economy. A respondent described the changes as, ‘Makaan change ho gaye, pashu palaan khatam ho gaya, pehnawa badal gaya. Language change ho gayee. Gujjaro ko language se pahchan lete thai. Ab wo bhi nahi raha’ (The houses changed, the cattle vanished, the clothing changed, language changed. We used to identify a Gujjar by their language, even that is changed). Apart from changes in the social environment, there have been changes in social relationships. Many respondents pointed out how the earlier social relationships, unity and togetherness have completely changed, because of money. ‘Logo ki unity khatam ho gayee hai, kyunki paise ki vajah se kisi ko kisi ki jarurat nahi hai’ (Unity among the people has reduced, because no one needs anybody because of financial independence). Another respondent stated, ‘Pahle ye culture tha ki beti ki shaadi nahi gaon ki beti kehte te, phle logo main attachment tha’ (The culture was

138  Heena Khari different, earlier in case of a wedding it was not wedding of a daughter of a family, rather it was the wedding of the daughter of the village, there was attachment before). Due to urbanisation, the village has lost the community feeling, and individualism is on the rise. There has been loss of village unity, which is causing distance between the villagers. People want to keep a distance from each other, as they believe that the village environment has tended to spoil their kids. This is the reason behind the backwardness of the Gujjars. A respondent said, ‘Goan main rahne ke nuksaan hain. Aaj humare bacche sharab pee rahe hain. Agar (urban) sector main rahte to humare bacche padh lete’ (There is a disadvantage of staying in villages. Today our kids drink, if we were living in urban areas our kids would also be studying). Another reason pointed out by the villagers is a lack of common space in the village. Earlier, the village had a choupal,3 where all the male members of the village used to gather. It was part of their daily routine. They used to finish their work and visit the choupal, where they could discuss their problems and concerns. Everyone used to come together and the problems of everyday life were shared. In Mandawali, the choupal was demolished in 2000 and in its place, a community centre got established. Unfortunately, the community centre remains locked, and hardly any functions or programs are organised there. This has taken away a common place that used to ensure regular social interactions among the villagers. All this has distanced the community members, and the 'we' feeling has been replaced by an 'I' feeing. There is a lack of brotherhood in the village; it is no longer the close-knit community it once was. The male respondents also talked about changes in the behaviour of children and young women, especially their daughters and daughtersin-law. One of the respondents stated, ‘Bacche apni marji chala rahe hain. Dukh toh hota hai par ab kya karain?’ (The kids are not listening to anyone; we feel sad but what can we do?) However, women express happiness about the changes to the village life. Previously, they stated, life was difficult, and due to the joint family system, their workload was severe. Women were responsible for the work at home (cooking, cleaning, washing clothes, child-rearing) and also work at the dairy farm (making cow dung cakes, bringing in fodder from the field for the cattle). There was a great deal work for the women and many restrictions on them. Women had no voice in decision-making, the power was centred around the male patriarch and the mother-in-law. Women had to cover their faces with veils. They recalled how over the years, women’s sense of attire has changed. ‘Yaha par ghagara kameej odana pahnte thai ab suit salwar pahnane lage’ (Earlier we had to wear a skirt, shirt and a duppata, now we wear salwar-kameej). Although the practice of using veils or coving their face in front of elders continues, the length of the veil has decreased over the years. In community gatherings even today, women are supposed to cover their heads, especially in front of their fathers-in-law. But things have changed. The younger generation is challenging this age-old custom, although such cases are only a few in number.

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  139 Educational attainment The data collected through the mapping of educational trends in Mandawali depicts a dip in illiteracy, from 66 per cent in 1915–1947 to 14 per cent in 1981–20004 (Figure 6.1). After 1947, secondary educational attainment gradually increased. In 1981–2000, about 38 per cent of Gujjar villagers had graduated from secondary school. Among the male population, there is a strong preference for professional courses among individuals born between 1981–2000. Data shows that about 31 per cent opted for professional courses, and only 13 per cent chose a general graduation degree (Figure 6.2). The reason can be explained through statements about the kind of education that the respondents preferred. One respondent stated, ‘Humare yaha label vali education ko jada mana jata hai jaise Law, Doctor, Engineer aur ladkio ke lia B.A, B.Ed ya D.Ed. kar lo’ (law, doctor, engineer degrees are given importance and for girls B.Ed or D.Ed.). The data shows a high number of doctors, engineers and lawyers among the Gujjars of this village. There has been a strong cultural ethos towards professional courses among the parents of the children, who expect lucrative returns from education. The village is cohesive, with personal contact among almost all the members. Indirectly, educational choices are determined by the community. Along with this, the cultural ethos inspire the parents to prefer professional courses for their children. This has led many children to pursue these courses. Female educational attainment is low in the Mandawali village, compared to its male counterpart. From 1915 to 1947, an alarming number of females were illiterate: that is 90 per cent of the females were found to be illiterate, with another 10 per cent having education as low as the primary level. The years 1948–1960 show an increase in female education, 80 70 66.7 60 Percentage

49.4 50 37.5

40 30

37.6

37

28.1

27.1

20

26.8

15.6

10

4.2

14 15.3 9.4 6.3 3.1

2.1

6.2

7.4

6.4

0 >1915-1947 Illiterate

Primary

1948-1960 Secondary

Graduation

1961-1980 Post Graduation

1981-2000 Professional Course

Figure 6.1  Trends in the educational achievement of the total population of Gujjars in Mandawali. Source: Field survey data collected between July and September 2018.

140  Heena Khari 80 70 66.7 60 Percentage

49.4 50 37.5

40 30

37.6

37

28.1

27.1

20

26.8

15.6

10

4.2

14 15.3 9.4 6.3 3.1

2.1

6.2

7.4

6.4

0 >1915-1947 Illiterate

Primary

1948-1960 Graduation

Secondary

1961-1980 Post Graduation

1981-2000 Professional Course

Figure 6.2  Trends in the educational achievement of the male population of Gujjars in Mandawali. Source: Field survey data collected between July and September 2018.

with 58 of females having a primary education and 8 percent a secondary education. The years after 1961 reflect a steady growth in the female education, with about 65 percent having a primary education and 21 percent a secondary educated, though only 13 per cent have acquired higher education. The years 1981–2000 showed another increase in female education, but still, their attainment-level is low. About 13 per cent of female have a primary education, 37 per cent have a secondary education, and 48 per cent have higher education (Figures 6.2 and 6.3). 100 90 90 80 65.6

70 58.3

Percentage

60 50 40

37.3

33.3

30

21.9

20 10

9.4

8.3

10

13.4

17.9 20.9 10.4

3.1

0 >1915-1947 Illiterate

Primary

1948-1960 Secondary

Graduation

1961-1980 Post Graduation

1981-2000 Professional Course

Figure 6.3   Trends in the educational achievement of the female population of Gujjars in Mandawali. Source: Field survey data collected between July and September 2018.

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  141 School choices In 1980, the choice of schools saw a major shift. Before then, parents preferred government schools; but after 1980, with the boom in the educational market, there has been a diversification in school choice. During 1948–1960, about 81 percent of parents preferred to send their children to government school, while during 1961–1980, this number increased to 93 per cent. However, the period from 1981–2000, saw a shift in school choice, with an increase in the number of parents who preferred to send their children to private schools. About 33 per cent of children went to private school (Table 6.1). Previously, the parents of Mandawali had preferred sending their children to the nearby government school, because it was the only one available in the immediate vicinity, and all the members of the community sent their children to this school. Therefore, community preference dominated individual choice. After 1980, there was a mushrooming of private schools extending better choices in the selection of private schools including low-budget private schools in the area. The choice of schools showed a disposition towards Low-Budget Private Schools (LBPSs)5 due to ‘achi padhae’(good education), easy admission, low fees, immediate vicinity and the English medium of instruction. Mandawali has a large number of LBPS. Parents ‘choose the “right” school, neighbourhood and extracurricular activities in order to improve their children’s position in society, as well as their own’ (Auðardóttir & Kosunen, 2020). Of the factors involved in making the choice of school, receiving advice from a friend or relative dominates, especially that of the immediate relations. Educational choices are complex, because multiple factors operate in the process. The choice seems to be made by the individuals; but in reality, systemic and community forces shape it. First, the state policies of the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) have initiated reforms such as land acquisition and the cattle ban. Second, the British attitude towards discriminating against Gujjars by labelling them a ‘criminal tribe’. Third factor related to the Gujjars’ cultural ethos, An analysis shows that the community’s underachievement is related to the values it places on education. The community was earlier involved in traditional agriculture and traditional knowledge. They did not place any importance to formal education at that time; hence, the population remained uneducated. However, with the changing times, understanding the importance of education, the cultural ethos is towards encouraging education among the community members. Fourth, gender is an important locus for making educational choices. The stereotypes attached to gender roles make specific subjects/ disciplines available to specific genders, hence limiting the choices for females and, in turn, leading them towards unequal opportunities. The data indicates that when parents make school choices, they prefer to spend more to educate a male child than to educate a female child. Parents prefer to send a male child to a private school, while a female child is sent to a

142  Heena Khari Table 6.1  Student enrolment by type of school in Mandawali Years Male

Female

Total

>1915–1947 1948–1960 1961–1980 1981–2000 2001–2018 Total >1915–1947 1948–1960 1961–1980 1981–2000 2001–2018 Total >1915–1947 1948–1960 1961–1980 1981–2000 2001–2018 Total

Private School

4.10 43.30 83.10 36.60 8.30 3.10 19.40 76.90 22.30 3.10 3.70 33.10 81.20 31.00

Government School 46.40 95.00 91.80 36.70 10.20 47.20 10.00 58.30 96.90 68.70 15.40 57.30 31.30 81.30 93.80 50.30 11.80 51.10

Central School

Multiple Schools

Special School 3.60

1.10 5.10 1.60

4.10 17.80 1.70 7.70

1.10 0.80

11.90 7.70 6.40 2.10

0.60 3.50 1.00

2.50 15.30 3.50 7.20

6.00 0.40

Source: Field survey data collected between July and September 2018.

government school. From 1981–2000, about 43 per cent of male children went to private school, while just 33 per cent of female children went to private school (Table 6.1). One interesting findings of the present study is the link between an occupation and investment in education. One respondent argued that there is strong link between rental income and a lower educational achievement: ‘Jis din in logo ki rental income khatam ho jaegi tab ye bacche padhenge. Merrut ki taraf chale jao bacche IPS, IAS Judge ban rahe hain’ (The day the rental income vanishes, that’s when the children will study, if you go towards Merrut, the children are becoming IPS, Judge and IAS). An analysis of data reported for the years 1915–1949 shows that the major sources of income in the village were drawn from agriculture and cattle-rearing. Village land was used for agriculture and cattle-rearing until the Land Acquisition Act was implemented. The three-phases of land acquisition in the years 1965, 1971 and 1972 completely took over their khasar land and destroyed the villagers’ traditional occupations. The villagers were given money in exchange for the land, but the change completely uprooted a continuous source of income from the village economy. The land and land-based economy was their major source of livelihood. It provided a sense of security

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  143 Solely dependent on Rent Govt. Job + Rent Pvt. Job Govt Job

Self employed + Rent Pvt Job + Rent Self Employed Agriculture

Percentage

80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 >1915-1947

1948-1960

1961-1980

1981-2000

Figure 6.4  Income sources of Mandawali villagers. Source: Field survey data collected between July and September 2018.

and power to the community, This was taken away due to the process of land acquisition. The population born from 1948–1960 depended on self-employment that is, 60 per cent of the total population owned a dairy, grocery shop, etc., about 25 per cent was employed in government jobs and 10 per cent depended on rental income (Figure 6.4). The period 1961–1980 continued to show a strong inclination towards self-employment, that is 54 per cent, followed by 26.5 per cent dependent on rental income. With the decline in rental income, households are forced to send their offsprings to schools and colleges, with the expectation of future returns from education.

Conclusion This study aims to analyse the educational choices of the Gujjar community in the socio-historical, political and economic contexts of the metropolitan urban spaces of Delhi. Historically, the community has been defined as a politically and economically powerful and aggressive, community but lacking in education and hence uncivilised. The present study investigated the pattern of the educational choices of the Gujjars of Delhi in the complex matrix of the urban system and community dynamics, which are negotiated in day-to-day life activities. The chapter aims to answer three critical questions: why are Gujjars not taking advantage of the wide sea of opportunities offered in the capital city of Delhi? Why are Gujjars not in top professional jobs and positions, which are generally linked with the acquisition of higher education? Why is the community, even with resources and access to educational opportunities, choosing not to avail themselves of higher education? The data has shown an eradication of illiteracy in the community over the years. However, there has been no significant change in the nature of education being pursued by the members of the community. A majority

144  Heena Khari of the Gujjars have ended their education after the secondary stage. Also, the new trends in education show that the females outperform their male counterparts. Historically, in 1915, there was high illiteracy among women, as their role, as defined by the community, was limited to child-rearing and domestic work. Over time, there have been changes in the community’s attitude toward female education, and the community is letting women pursue higher studies. However, the choices in term of schools, courses and job options still remain limited for women. This study finds a strong correlation between the cultural ethos and cultural capital of the community, with reference to their educational achievement. The motivation to pursue education is linked to earning a livelihood. A declining trend is observed in educational achievements among the Gujjar community from 1915 to 2000, because of easy flow of rental income in the village. An analysis of family trees shows that the cultural ethos of the families towards education has changed over time, in response to systemic forces. When the outcome of education was not rated and valued for earning money, parents were less concerned about educating their children. It appears that money, time and efforts were not to be invested for acquiring skills and jobs that educational degrees could lead to. In recent times, there has been more motivation for education, mainly due to dwindling in the rental income and the increasing status attached to education, as service has become one of the most lucrative avenues for earning money. This study finds that the choices of education among the urban Gujjars were affected by detrimental state policies, discrimination, a negative cultural image and dependency on rental income, which in due course made the community lazy and unproductive. Moreover, the patriarchal norm of giving less importance to the females of the community continues among the Gujjars, especially with regard to education. The interplay of community and systemic forces is decisive while making educational choices. Ogbu’s cultural ecology theory and Bourdieu’s concept of cultural ethos were deployed in this study to explain and elucidate the notion of force in community, its limits, and its possibilities with reference to choice in education. The cultural ethos of the community changed over time, along with a political economy changing in favour of higher education. Similarly, the rate of return from an educational investment in turn reinforced the cultural ethos of the community. The study aspires to add to the scant literature on urban Gujjars through the lens of the sociology of education and a general critical understanding about the roles of systematic and cultural forces in the domain of choices. Concern for the Gujjar community has not been featured in policy making, neither of the British government nor in post-independence India. However, the recent series of Gujjars agitation in Rajasthan has brought the community into the public discourse through their demand for reservations in educational institutions and government jobs. These demands need to be understood in the historical-spatial context of the community. There has been a growing insecurity in the community regarding its comparatively poor educational

Educational choices of Gujjars in the urban peripheries  145 achievement and the quality of jobs held by its members. This growing insecurity is born out of the feeling that the reservation system is an effective way to acquire education hence the community requires education for increasing their educational achievement. While beyond the scope of the present study, this aspect merits further research.

Notes 1 The DDA is responsible for city planning and the MCD is responsible for the development of water, electricity and building regulations. The policies adopted by the MCD and DDA are crucial for the structure of the villages. The MCD and DDA used the 1908 land survey, which exempted the aabaadi land from the developmental policy of the city. 2 Different compensation amounts were based on different land types and usage. 3 Choupal is a community building or space in the rural areas of North India. 4 The division of the periods 1915–1947, 1948–1960, 1961–1980, 1981–2000 is not random. Each year played a crucial role in village history. 5 LBPS (low-budget private school) refers to low-fee private schools that have come up in response to the demand of families aiming for an English-medium education at a low cost.

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7 Contesting learning spaces in higher education Problems of language acquisition Anup Kumar Bali

Language is a structured system of communicative exchange in society, specifically, an exchange of meaning. The critical function of language is to create a space for sharing common meanings according to communicative structures shaped by institutional processes. In a multilingual context, acquiring and becoming proficient in a language in an educational environment is a challenging task; the hegemony of a particular language over others makes the domain of learning antagonistic. Students coming from different linguistic groups are forced to use the English language, which is privileged in academic transactions, as a necessary condition for progress. By contrast, a vernacular language such as Hindi, which is grounded in everyday transactions, is not placed well in academic discourse. In his 2014 book, Hindi is our ground, English is our sky, Chaise LaDousa envisages this relational and mutually constructive relation between English and Hindi. This chapter explores relationality, in the context of abstraction from concrete realities, as the equalisation of discursive rationality in the process of constituting an official language, on the one hand, and the process of knowledge-transaction in a university classroom, on the other. For LaDousa, this relational and mutually constructive relation produces language ideologies and sociolinguistic identities that aim to demarcate the spaces of Hindi and English (Wessler, 2015: 247). These (pre)defined and (pre)determined spaces make language merely an ideological apparatus of the nation-state with its relational discursivity that explains and defines ideologies of language. Relationality is significant not only from the viewpoint of language ideology, but it also explains the aspiration towards English and its relation with increasing globalisation in the last three decades and the rise of new economic activities and job opportunities in India. Language plays a pivotal role in society. On the one hand, it is inevitable for communication, and on the other hand, it plays out multiple functions in the societal production and reproduction of the conditions of production. Other than its specific function in organizing the production-process of society in a particular way, language is used by the ruling classes as an ideological state apparatus to maintain and ensure the status quo. By using linguistic differences to defend its privileges, the ruling class maintains asymmetrical relations in society. The ruling class sustains

Contesting learning spaces in higher education  149 an epistemological hegemony and its concomitant prejudices, fostered by linguistic differences. This justifies the prevalence of hierarchy and consequently enables the reproduction of new conditions of hierarchy. Dileep Chavhan elucidates this inherent relationship of linguistic hegemony and the ruling classes: Language is not just a medium of communication; it is also a carrier of ideology. In India, the Sanskrit language was a carrier of Brahmanical ideology. The upper classes of society strive to become part of the ruling classes by learning their language. In medieval India Brahmins had imbibed Persian – the language of the ruling class, on a large scale. Later on, they also gained the upper hand on English language when the British arrived. Upper castes have had a monopoly over Indian English education since colonial times. [My translation and emphasis] (2015: 43) The ideological apparatus of language in reproducing conditions of production makes language a site of agency and structure. Navigating this structure, individual and social groups acquire their identity and social existence. Though language is used as tool to mobilise and unite people for a shared understanding, it is also used to divide people. This particular function of language can adequately delineate the peculiarity of linguistic nationalism, which tries to mobilize people upon language, while at the same time, language can also become the source of conflict. India being a multilingual state, conflicts have been apparent between different language groups throughout history. In an unequal society such as India’s, language has been used by the dominating classes, castes and communities as an ideological apparatus to perpetuate the prevailing inequality. Analyzing the contemporary Indian situation from this viewpoint is significant because of the hierarchal nature of language and the social segregation of people based on caste and class. The language hierarchy is mediated by abstract rationality, which produces the dominant conception of language. The enforcement of a particular language among diverse language groups reveals the hegemonic function of the state in legitimising a particular language as the standard language. Samir Karmakar explains: What could be the definition of language is not the right question to start with; rather, we need to ask how language is produced through different processes. In other words, what is the legitimate language is not the issue at all; rather one should ask how one particular language among many others is appropriated as a product – legitimized as ‘the signifier’ among the signifiers. (2014: 166) Through the legitimation of a particular language among many others, the official approach of the state tries to equalize the differences and

150  Anup Kumar Bali particularities of concrete ground realities into the so-called discursive rationality. The particular language that the state endorses is adequate and a valid expression of this equalisation of discursive rationality which constitutes what French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu would call the linguistic market. He explains the constitution of the linguistic market while explicating this legitimisation of a particular language: In order for one mode of expression among others (a particular language in the case of bilingualism, a particular use of language in the case of a society divided into classes) to impose itself as the only legitimate one, the linguistic market has to be unified and the different dialects (of class, region or ethnic group) have to be measured practically against the legitimate language or usage. Integration into a single 'linguistic community’, which is a product of the political domination that is endlessly reproduced by institutions capable of imposing universal recognition of the dominant language, is the condition for the establishment of relations of linguistic domination. (1991: 45–46) Today, the hierarchisation of languages and mediation among languages through the equalisation of discursive rationality is intrinsically tied to market forces, the dynamics of capital and Brahmanical hegemony.1 This rationality is immanently irrational, since the equalisation came into being – as we have seen – through the abstraction of concrete ground realities. The contradiction between the legitimate official language and concrete realities becomes the site of a political struggle. The ruling classes use the power-relations embedded in language as an ideological tool for the constitution and establishment of hegemony. This chapter unpacks the potential contradiction between vernacular Hindi and the English language, with the latter being more a legitimate idiom than the former in a metropolitan university in Delhi. This chapter seeks to understand the dynamics of linguistic hegemony in higher education, in the context of Ambedkar University Delhi (AUD). It is based on an empirical investigation conducted by the Progressive and Democratic Students’ Community (PDSC) in 2016 (Progressive and Democratic Students’ Community, 2017). The chapter examines the politics and power relations involved in language question at AUD in 2016–2017, within the organisational structure of the PDSC. The PDSC completed an in-depth survey to probe English language problems among university students, including the testimonies and experiences of students in 2016–2017. The experiences at AUD and quantitative data show how the language problem, meaning the compulsory use of English in higher education, becomes a reason for the social exclusion from university education of working class and lower caste students. The PDSC demonstrated that students are excluded because of the compulsory use of the English language, a reality even in elite educational institutions of metropolitan India through the public discourses of these very institutions. The experiences

Contesting learning spaces in higher education  151 of AUD students show how the compulsory use of one language, i.e. English, becomes a prominent reason for social exclusion from university education, especially among the working class and lower caste populations. Conducted among 401 students2 (ranging from BA to PhD candidates), the survey demonstrates that students from Hindi/regional-medium and government school backgrounds, which include the schools in the lowest fee brackets, are the ones who struggle to understand the core readings within the classroom. By contrast, students from better and more expensive schools struggle with different levels of issue related to language, not just problems with basic English. There is a great deal of debate and discussion about the language question in school education; but it is not widely discussed in the context of higher education. Significantly, the Kothari commission, 1964–1966, emphasized the need to produce books and scientific literature in regional languages for higher education. The commission advocated regional languages as mediums of instruction in higher education, while admitting the complexity and intractability of the language question in India (Progressive and Democratic Students’ Community, 2017; Report of the Education Commission, 1964–1966, 1970: 19–21). But in reality, the language question has been reduced to just three language policies for school education, on the one hand, and the compulsory use of the English language in higher education, on the other. This has complicated the situation for students who studied at non-metropolitan schools, who were basically taught in vernacular languages. These complexities in metropolitan higher education have been conveniently ignored. Tejaswani Niranajana sees this as the main problem for non-metropolitan students. She writes: About six million students (40% of all enrolled students) from non-metropolitan India enter the system every year and fail to achieve their educational goals because they are unable to cope with English. Public elementary education in India has been largely moving towards Indian language instruction, but in higher education globalisation has only reinforced the position of English as the single most important language for teaching and research. Caught in this tug-of-war, the higher education student from a non-metropolitan context finds it impossible to survive. Less than 15% of the relevant age group enters higher education, of which only 17% goes on to obtain a postgraduate (PG) degree. One of the significant reasons is the enormous linguistic divide within Indian higher education, a divide that has severe consequences for occupational, economic and social mobility, and the quality of life, of non-metropolitan students. [My emphasis] (2013: 14) There is process which divides the knowledge-transaction and knowledge-production within university spaces into diverse segments related to different student groups or which classify students in different groups in the

152  Anup Kumar Bali metropolitan location, such as AUD. For analytical purposes, this chapter is divided into three parts. First, it introduces and describes the empirical details collected from the fieldwork conducted at the AUD Kashmiri Gate campus. Second, it engages with the question of the university in the prevailing neoliberal conjuncture and the role of English in knowledge-transaction and knowledge-production within university classrooms. Third, I discuss the results, in light of the testimonies collected as part of the survey. This chapter indeed questions the hegemonic and exclusionary character of English-medium education in metropolitan Delhi. Moreover, it seeks to explore the structures of the power-relations and politics of language acquisition and proficiency, which were reported on by prominent newspapers at the time the fieldwork was conducted.3

Methodology The fieldwork was carried out at Dr. B.R. Ambedkar University Delhi (AUD), a public funded university with a multi-campus, unitary structure which offers research, postgraduate and undergraduate courses in the social sciences and humanities. AUD was established by the Government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi in 2007. While it is a state university of the Government of NCT of Delhi, the medium of instruction is solely English, despite the fact that the Delhi state has recognized three other official languages: Hindi, Urdu and Punjabi. The urgent need to conduct the survey resulted from the continuous struggle of students at the university over the last seven years4 to accommodate other state languages for the purpose of entrance examinations and evaluation. This survey was assisted by the tremendous efforts of the student community; a large number of students from the Progressive and Democratic Students’ Community (PDSC) worked at various levels, such as making extensive reports on the problems related to language. The survey identified problems associated with the hegemony of the English language. On the one hand, it questioned the notion of connecting the language problem only with higher education in non-metropolitan cities, and hence on the other hand, it revealed the linguistic hegemony of the English language in higher education in metropolitan cities, which continuously resulted in the exclusion of the student from poor and ‘lower’ caste communities. With 23 questions, the survey addressed the language problem in the context of caste, class and gender. The field survey was conducted at the Kashmere Gate campus of AUD, with a sample of 401 students (see Table  7.1); 233 students responded to questions related to the kind of school they had attended. Schools were classified under three categories: government, private and semi-private. Only 57 out of 233 students5 attended government schools, whereas 158 attended private schools. The survey report revealed that 394 students had paid school fees. The fee structure was divided into four categories: 0–200, 200–1,000, 1,000–2,000 and more than 2,000 (all in

Contesting learning spaces in higher education  153 Table 7.1  Sample distribution by category and gender Category

Female

Male

Total

General OBC SC ST Total

165 21 24 18 228

120 28 21 4 173

285 49 45 22 401

Source: Field data rupees). This data indicates that only a small number of students from the lowest fee bracket are admitted to AUD. The graph illustrates the direct relation between school fees and the number of students. Only 12.4 per cent of students attended the schools with the lowest fee, whereas the percentage reaches 53.8 per cent for the students who belong to the school having the highest monthly fee (i.e. more than 2,000). This data explicitly indicates an elitist domination in accessing entry into AUD, since as the school fee increases, the number of students also increases (see Figure 7.1). After setting the social location of AUD, it is pertinent to reflect upon language question. The students were asked whether they faced any problems in understanding the readings given to them in class and what difficulties they faced in relation to language. The next question addressed the complication that students encounter problems in reading comprehension. For analytical purposes, student responses were grouped into five major categories to trace language-related problems. At a primary level, we predominantly observe the basic English language problem which we cover 450 394

400

No. of Students

350 300 250

212

200 150 100 49

67

66

50 0 0-200

200-1000 1000-2000 >2000 School Fee Per Month (Rs.)

Figure 7.1  Distribution of students with school fee per month. Source: Field data.

Total

154  Anup Kumar Bali broadly in this chapter. In a broad sense, it can be said that there are students who face problems related to vocabulary, grammar or structuring a single sentence in English. So, the basic English language problem constitutes the first category. In the second stage, all of those answers were collected together, showing the problem of academic language or intellectual jargon, etc. Hence, the second category is academic jargon. The third category addresses the questions and problems that arise in classrooms when complex ideas are discussed. The fourth category addresses the lack of confidence while interacting with the teacher in class. The fifth and last level captures multiple reasons such as readings that were too long, a lack of background in the subject, laziness, disengagement from the experience, and so on. While comparing the responses to language-oriented questions with the fee structure students paid during their schooling, it was found that students who attended schools in the lowest fee bracket are the least equipped to use basic English. This suggests that those least inclined and least able to accept and adopt the dominating and validated language are also those exposed for the shortest time to this language, as argued by Bourdieu and discussed in next section. This becomes more relevant in the context of AUD, where all the readings provided for students are in English. This exclusionary move has grave implications which become clearer from the student’s testimonies, discussed in the last section of this chapter. It is evident from field observation that most of the students who attended schools in the lowest fee bracket struggle with basic language problems. 28 out of 37 students who attended lowest-bracket schools face basic language problems, whereas the figure is just 33 out of 118, in the case of the highest-fee bracket (see Table 7.2). In a similar analysis of a different social category, the data reveals that 22 out of 34 Scheduled Caste students face basic language problems, or 64.7 per cent. This is in stark contrast to the number for general category students, which is 43 out of 161, or just 26.7 per cent. Among the Other

Table 7.2  Variation of school fee and factors for difficulty in learning School Fee Per Month (In Rs) Factors for difficulty Rs 0–200 Rs 200–1,000 Rs1,000–2,000 > Rs 2,000 Total Language Problem Academic Jargon Complexity of Ideas Lack of Confidence Other Reasons Total Source: Field data

28 4 1 0 4 37

19 6 7 0 5 37

10 10 12 0 11 43

33 38 18 4 25 118

90 58 38 04 45 235

Contesting learning spaces in higher education  155 Backward Class (OBC) students, 18 out of 23, or 78.26 per cent, face problems associated with English-language proficiency. From the field data, we can infer that the higher the fee, the less the difficulty in basic English across all five parameters. In contrast, the higher the difficulty with English, the lesser the fee, where students are still attempting to go beyond the problems enlisted in the first level. The following section discusses the place of the university in the prevailing neoliberal conjuncture and the role of English in knowledge-transaction and knowledge-production within university classrooms.

The university in a neoliberal era and knowledge-production in the classroom Before addressing the dynamics of the production-processes and power-relations embedded in the university classroom on the language question, it is important to consider the location of the university within a neoliberal framework. To trace out the implications of the exclusionary character of compulsory English-medium education at AUD, we envision the institutional mechanism and the process of knowledge-production and knowledge-transaction in the classroom, while contextualizing the role of the English language. How do we conceive of the neoliberal university, beyond its role as what Marxist thinker Louis Althusser describes as an ideological state apparatus (2012)? In this regard, Ravi Kumar states that the idea of education has been changed drastically with the neoliberal intervention. Consequently, neoliberal education provides skills and serves ‘the factories of different types – from automobile units to the universities’ (Kumar, 2014: 12). The globalized neoliberal trend in higher education considers educational transactions as a consumer good rather than a public good. Consequently, students and academics are considered ‘clients’ and ‘service providers’ (Mayo, 2019: 5). It is equally important to reflect upon the ideological role of education in a neoliberal scenario. Kumar elaborates its ideological role as the reproduction of the conditions of production, which ‘quantifies everything, standardizes everything and looks ever-new ways of measuring how well students and teachers are serving (or going to serve) the demands of the economy and the thought processes necessary for sustaining the system’ (2014: 13). This perpetual measuring of self-activity of students and teachers in favor of the system is the central role of the neoliberal university today. Marxist thinker Pothik Ghosh envisages the production-process within a university-process under the ambit of ideological reproduction. For him, the university is an emblematic site of capitalism, since here ‘the determination of alienating work is apparent both in the register of reproduction (for students-becoming workers) and production (teachers, researchers, other staff members but also students)’ (2010: 79). In the production of labour power, the neoliberal university actively engages in the reproduction of class and the perpetuation of the hegemonic values of the societal order (Bowles & Gintis, 1976: 201–202). Henry Heller, in his

156  Anup Kumar Bali book The Capitalist University, differentiates the recent rise of the neoliberal university from its modern outlook. He writes, Modern universities have always had a close relationship with private business, but whereas in the past faculty labour served capital by producing educated managers, highly skilled workers and new knowledge as a largely free good, strenuous efforts are now underway to transform academic employment into directly productive, i.e., profitable labour (Heller, 2016: 2). Within this framework of the reproductive and productive role of the university, it is significant to recognize the hegemonic function of English as a medium of instruction which totalizes the process of knowledge-production and its transaction under the form of Anglicized abstraction. This form of Anglicized abstraction constitutes the reified social-relations within and beyond the university, academia, research institutions and academic publishing houses, which inclusively shapes what Bourdieu would call the linguistic market. Bourdieu states that the sociology of education is inseparable from the sociology of language and elaborates upon the dynamics of cultural capital, which results in social exclusion. He writes: In this sense, like the sociology of culture, the sociology of language is logically inseparable from a sociology of education. As a linguistic market strictly subject to the verdicts of the guardians of legitimate culture, the educational market is strictly dominated by the linguistic products of the dominant class and tends to sanction the pre-existing differences in capital. The combined effect of low cultural capital and the associated low propensity to increase it through educational investment condemns the least favoured classes to the negative sanctions of the scholastic market, i.e. exclusion or early self-exclusion induced by lack of success. The initial disparities therefore tend to be reproduced since the length of inculcation tends to vary with its efficiency: those least inclined and least able to accept and adopt the language of the school are also those exposed for the shortest time to this language and to educational monitoring, correction and sanction. (1991: 62) Hence, with the increasing generalisation of the linguistic market, the process of knowledge-production is reduced into the domain of commodity-production, and the Anglicized abstraction becomes the universal equivalence to equalize and reduce diverse concrete labour processes into ‘human labour in the abstract’ (Marx, 2014: 46). In volume one of Capital, Marx renders this relation of the universal equivalence to human labour in the abstract in the context of commodity production. He writes: It is the expression of equivalence between different sorts of commodities that alone brings into relief the specific character of value-creating

Contesting learning spaces in higher education  157 labour, and thus it does by actually reducing the different varieties of labour embodied in the different kinds of commodities to their common quality of human labour in abstract. (Marx, 2014: 57) It is important to consider the societal implications of Anglicized abstraction in knowledge-production and knowledge-transaction in contemporary university spaces. What is this concept all about? How does it impact our subjectivity, and finally, what is its relationship to global market forces? Samir Karmakar alludes to the grave implications of this abstraction, stating that the assertion of English in the field of education is not only a communicative assertion but rather a conceptual function of English as process/medium which shapes ‘our identity, our thought, and our aspiration through various means. As a process, it serves the purpose of internal reorganisations and new institutional arrangements to accommodate locals in the framework of competing global market forces’ (2014: 163). The evidence from AUD shows that the compulsory use of the English language alienates students within the classroom. The testimonies and experiences of students, as discussed in the last section of this chapter, help us understand the divisions within the classroom, which take place in the process of knowledge-production and knowledge-transaction. These testimonies reveal the anxieties, estrangement and troubles of the student community. Hence, it is worth-exploring the work-relation of students in the domain of knowledge-production and knowledge-transaction in this context. Knowledge-production and knowledge-transaction in the classroom are not homogeneous processes, as they manifest the complex structures and segmentations of a hierarchy. Hence, the pertinent questions here would be about how we can envision the task given to students in a university and classroom as work. How does the student’s social location impact him/her in this work of knowledge-production? And finally, how does the compulsory use of English impact his/her productivity (performance in a traditional sense) within the classroom? In this way, we need to inquire into the act of studying as work in the specific context of the language question. The last question is intrinsically related to the second question, especially in the context of location, the accessibility of the university in a metropolitan space and how these factors implicate the learning process. I intend to understand the relationship between student work and alienation within the classroom and reflect upon the academic workload of students in classrooms, asking whether this leads to his/her alienation. The reduction of students’ concrete labour into the abstraction of English or the Anglicized abstraction within the classroom alienates students from learning. In the contemporary pedagogical scenario, the content of students’ concrete labour is evaluated based on abstraction; abstraction in/of English. In this process of the abstraction of students’ concrete labour, the compulsory use of English has a decisive role. Even the example of a class presentation makes this explicit, where students have to express their thought process directly, in speech. Language plays a pertinent role in thought and

158  Anup Kumar Bali expression. The concrete useful labour of imbibing reading by students is rendered in a form of Anglicized abstraction within the classroom. Harjinder Singh Laltu states that even if thinking is not entirely linguistic, ‘language is probably the most important component of how thinking takes place’ (2014: 143). He sees an inconsistency between content and form, when a speaker uses a language that is different from the one that is natural to him/her: When the … person uses a language different from one that is most natural to them, often the content is devoid of the precision that is there in natural language. We may think that we convey what we mean but the actual thought conveyed may not be the same (ibid). This inconsistency of content and form is an inconsistency of concrete labour and its evaluation as abstract labour. Precisely this is what the abstract evaluation does which, while disciplining a student to speak in English during a presentation, alienates him from his very thought-process or the process of concrete labour that constitutes his thought. Hence, this kind of evaluation is abstract evaluation which represses and hides the concrete useful labour of the student by the abstraction of academic English as a universal equivalence within the classroom. Marx reminds us that this notion of the equivalence or equalisation of human labour is based on a particular popular prejudice regarding equality, and this is precisely the functionality of abstract equality, when in a classroom we consider all the students as equal, without looking into the segmentations among them. Marx writes, with reference to this popular prejudice regarding human equality: The secret of the expression of value, namely, that all kinds of labour are equal and equivalent, because and so far as they are human labour in general, cannot be deciphered, until the notion of human equality has already acquired the fixity of popular prejudice. This, however, is possible only in a society in which the great mass of produce of labour takes the form of commodities, in which, consequently, the dominant relation between man and man, is that of owners of commodities. (2014: 65–66) This equalisation of unequal differences could be rendered through the capability of students to imbibe prescribed readings in a classroom. Field evidence shows that students have different levels of capability vis-à-vis prescribed readings. The trend shows that if the number of prescribed readings per week increases, then a large numbers of students are not able to keep up with them, or in other words, they are unable to imbibe these readings that are the basic requirement for pedagogical evaluation and hence may not lead to diversive productivity. In addition to this, there is a stark difference between general students and those of other categories, and similarly, between students coming from schools in the lowest fee bracket and from schools in

Contesting learning spaces in higher education  159 the highest fee bracket. This makes it clear that the prevailing pedagogy and evaluation method informed with Anglicized abstraction in the university equalizes the stark unequal or non-equal differences among students, while homogenizing them. This abstract equalisation turns against the principles of equality. This is what the principle of equality itself which represses and hides the unequal/non-equal concrete human labour. ‘The equalisation of the most different kinds of labour can be the result only of an abstraction from their inequalities, or of reducing them to their common denominator, viz., expenditure of human labour or the human labour in abstraction’ (Marx, 2014: 76). This abstraction of concrete human labour is also an abstraction of use-value into exchange-value. The next section of this chapter discusses the contradictions in this imposed homogeneity, with empirical evidence collected from the testimonies of the students. It reveals the repression of the use-value of their concrete labour under the Anglicized abstraction of evaluation.

Implications and discussion The difficulties students face in acquiring English language skills in the university system may result in their leaving classes unattended, which could ultimately cause them to drop out.6 The field data reveals the number of students who could not complete a course in a given duration or left the course in between and different categories. In the academic years from 2009–2014, a total of 2,008 master students were admitted to the university. Of these, 1,356 students (i.e. 67.5 per cent) received their degrees by 2016. The passing percentage of SC, ST and OBC students was 47.4 per cent, 55.1 per cent and 63.07 per cent, respectively whereas for the general category, this rate was 72.8 per cent. It is evident that a large number of SC students drop out, i.e. 52.6 per cent. As mentioned earlier, the English language remains a major problem for SC and OBC students. It may be one reason for the high dropout rates. Similarly, among the undergraduates, a total of 806 students obtained admission in the academic years from 2010–2013, and 50 per cent completed the programme by 2016. Moreover, among the social categories, the success rates were 32.18 per cent, 25 per cent and 52.9 per cent for the SC, ST and OBC students, respectively in contrast to general category, which was 53.8 per cent. In courses for the BA degree, the dropout rate for SC students was 67.72 per cent, whereas for ST students, it was 75 per cent.7 A lack of English proficiency becomes a hurdle for these historically deprived communities to successfully complete their studies. Classrooms with English-medium instruction are the sites of hierarchy as well as exclusion. Strict rules or the medium of instruction cause the high dropout rate among the lower section of students, as we discussed. The Anglicized abstraction represses a student’s empirical usefulness, and consequently, his/her work becomes just a relational comparison within the hierarchal structure (based on grades/marks) of the classroom. Isn’t this a reduction of the student’s use-value into an exchange-value, which is fundamentally premised upon comparison and relationality? In this way, isn’t

160  Anup Kumar Bali the work-process informed with alienating language within the classroom, which represses the usefulness of a student’s labour while reducing it to a hierarchal relationality based on its exchange-value? The value-form of this hierarchical relationality within the classroom is grades and marks, which divides the production-process of the classroom into diverse segments. It then becomes clear that the academic institution reproduces the very same hierarchies which prevail in society. Although sociologist André Béteille finds a contradiction between the hierarchical social order and the political desirability of Indian universities as a site of maintaining equality, ‘having turned the light of criticism on the social hierarchies outside, the universities cannot screen their own internal arrangements from the same light’ (Béteille, 1988: 114). A female student in a master’s programme writes, ‘AUD’s so-called democratic space should practice not only its ideal but pedagogic practice. There is no point comparing a student from different background without taking their individual difference into account all this leads to is Social hierarchies