Sunday, August 31, 2003		Books

Breaking the barriers to universal education
B.B. Goel

Community Participation and Empowerment in Primary Education
edited by R. Govinda and Rashmi Diwan. Sage, Delhi. Pages 255. Rs 295.

NETWORKING within the public, private and governmental framework ensures that public funds are leveraged and the quality of service is improved, thus yielding better value for money.

In the social sector, education as an indispensable part of human resource development holds the key to development. In the words of Sai Baba, education lends beauty to man and confers on him wealth, name and fame.

In India, ranking 127th among 175 countries, as per the latest Human Development Index, millions have never been to primary school. This is despite the fact that the Union Government through Constitutional amendments has been formulating, modifying and reinventing a national system of education through a decentralised management structure by effecting a greater degree of collaboration with community-based organisations.

The various strategies initiated include creating parental awareness, community mobilisation and involvement, district primary education programmes, mid-day meal schemes, education guarantee schemes, alternative and innovative education, and the latest Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan.

The volume by Govinda and Rashmi Diwan attempts to focus on the grassroots efforts among civil society, government and NGOs for community participation towards primary education in some of the states.

There is no doubt that community participation and empowerment have the inherent potential to educate masses, increase awareness levels, improve living conditions and ultimately enrich their lifestyles. But, these benefits can accrue only if the generally reluctant parents are exhorted to take keen interest in the education of their children and the rigid administrative regime is fully liberalised.

However, the terrain from community participation to community empowerment is not so smooth and is conditioned by redistribution of powers, accountability and money, coupled with preparedness of the community to accept such a lofty challenge.

In Rajasthan, based on the Lok Jumbish experiment, capabilities of self-management among village communities evolve through practice rather than prescription. The process of school mapping and micro planning is carried out by informal voluntary groups, Core Teams, right at the village level. Unlike district as an administrative unit, block-level bodies (official and non-official) are empowered to finalise decisions in consultation with their clusters (20-25 villages).

Such a decentralised management approach ensures participatory diagnosis and planning as well as self-direction by the community.

Although the State endeavours to act as a facilitator, than a regulator of primary education, in the absence of any legitimising Lok Jumbish model and at the same time not dismantling the traditional departmental structure, the two parallel systems can eventually lead to friction and discontentment amongst the new stakeholders.

Madhya Pradesh, unlike Rajasthan, has adopted the formal route to empower village communities by restructuring the existing governmental framework. In addition to formal schools and the DPEP project, the government guarantees setting up schools under the Education Guarantee and Alternative Schemes, provided suitable space, local resources and a minimum level of student participation are ensured by the community. The "shiksha karmis" recruited by the Janpad Panchayat and the "guruji" nominated by the village community at nominal salary, being local and familiar with the children’s language and culture, work without being on government rolls.

Bureaucratic control, however, continues primarily on two counts: two parallel education systems and more responsibility than powers assigned to P.R. Bodies under the 1993 mandate.

Community empowerment is taking place in Kerala too, having the distinction of schooling mostly under private management, though fully supported by state funding.

The educational process has received a shot in the arm through the efforts of an NGO, the Kerala Shastra Sahitya Parishad. It has been motivating and involving MTAs, PTAs, neighbourhood groups and beneficiary groups in bringing resources and clients from the community into schools, taking schooling out into other institutions in the community, and building joint facilities. But, such popular interventions are hindered due to a lack of co-operation from the bureaucracy and the politically divided local self-governing institutions.

This book also highlights experiences of Bihar and Karnataka. In theses states more emphasis is on NGOs and the latest state-sponsored quasi-legal DPEP framework under which village education committees (VEC) are expected to perform the role of school governing bodies. Despite the fact that NGOs are closer to the community, the sustainability of their participation is viewed with suspicion. As regards VECs, undoubtedly, these have played a yeoman service in promoting community participation. But there are several instances when the bureaucracy, instead of working in tandem, has ignored them.

While the work deserves praise for narrating various states’ experiences, no plausible alternative with an all-India perspective has been proposed.