Education policy to ‘correct’ education system to be rolled out in Dec: Minister

He said threadbare discussions were held on the new education policy, which is in its final stages. 

“The NDA governments new education policy is in its final stages and the same will be out in December. The policy envisages correcting the education system that has followed a colonial mindset,” the minister of state for human resources said. After Independence, most academicians unfortunately followed the footsteps of British and western scholars and “deliberately” denigrated Indian culture, he said. 

The minister said the biggest challenge facing the education system and government was how to “decolonise” the Indian mind, and added that the nation has to keep pace with the world in this field. 

Some issues to be addressed are -- improving the quality of education at the primary level, making higher education affordable and ensuring more people have access to education, he said after inaugurating the National Academic meet here. Skill development was a major area to which the government has given thrust. But more has to be done on this, Singh said. 

To prevent exodus of students abroad for education,he said higher education institutions matching the standards of centres of international excellence should be developed. 

The MoS said accessibility to higher education in India was only 25.6 per cent while it was 86 per cent in USA, 80 per cent in Germany and 60 per cent in China. 

“The aim is to improve the higher education system in the country to make it available to more,” he said. Singh said the challenge before the government was to remove social and regional disparities in students having access to higher education and to make it affordable to all. 

“In some places access to higher education is as low as nine per cent, but in others it is 60 per cent...higher education is very expensive and has to be made more affordable to all sections of the society,” he said.