Corruption,
Hunger, Ignorance and Disease are the major problems that confront the
Nation today. The foursome defies easy solution. Although poverty and
illiteracy have come down percentage-wise the number of poor and
illiterate people are going up primarily because of unchecked population
growth. Low productivity, ignorance and superstitions are the other
causes. It is time people in power realize the urgency to act now to
solve the problems. Ready solutions do exist.
Universal Education
Poverty and illiteracy are linked with each other. Mere literacy cannot
remove the ignorance and superstition from the minds of the common
people. Education up to the level of elementary school should be made
Universal. Government initiatives have so far been insufficient and
ineffective. To realize the goal, a new Gurukul scheme shifting the
initiative to single-teacher schools in every street and hamlet needs to
be implemented. The broad features are as follows:
To
achieve the goal of universal education all the children under 15
years of age will be enrolled compulsorily in a neighborhood
government school. Classes at the primary level can be held outside
the school compound entrusted to qualified persons such as educated
women and retired teachers. This would ease the space problem in
schools as also save much expenditure in infrastructure.
A network
of single teacher schools will be promoted by awarding incentives.
There will be common syllabus based on the Gandhian concept of basic
education. The government will hold a terminal examination with
certificate of literacy, Primary School Leaving Certificate, issued
to the successful students.
Under the
system, the government’s responsibility will be limited to
conducting public examinations twice a year and allocating funds
towards incentives to teachers at the rate of at least Rs 2,000 each
for every student who passes out the government examination. Every
teacher will be assigned not more than 20 students at a time. They
can conduct the classes at their homes or nearby community halls or
even in the open. They may be permitted to charge a nominal fee to
pay for assistance, equipments and other facilities.
NGOs can
be involved in this project to identify the eligible children and
enroll them in schools and also recruit qualified teachers. Free
food, books and notebooks can be distributed through the NGOs.
Education
from sixth standard onwards up to the Secondary school will be in
regular classrooms. Free education, mid-day meal and books and
notebooks will be provided by the State in Government schools. The
syllabus will be common for both government and private schools. A
public examination will be conducted at the end of the 10th standard
and a certificate, Secondary School Leaving Certificate, will be
issued for the successful candidates making them eligible for most
of the government jobs or higher education.
The
medium of instruction will be mother tongue up to primary level,
with English as additional subject. Hindi or one other Indian
language will be optional. At secondary level the medium of
instruction will be English for science subjects and the respective
mother tongue for other subjects.
The new
Gurukul scheme will cover all the children, including school dropouts
and those engaged in child labor, making Universal Education possible in
a very short time at relatively low cost. It will also open up thousands
of job opportunities to the educated unemployed.
Linking of Rivers and
National Waterways
A 560,000-crore grandiose scheme to link the National Rivers has been
finalized and is waiting for execution for years. Thirty segments have
been identified but the project is yet to take off in any significant
manner. Much confusion prevails over the question of how to go about it.
Lack of coordinated approach is evident from the endless discussions and
debates resulting in costly delays. Shortcut ways to execute the
projects effectively and speedily must be found. The mega project should
be brought under the National Waterways scheme as a multipurpose
project.
Interlinking Godavari and
Cauvery
To begin
with, linking Godavari in Andhra Pradesh and Cauvery in Tamil Nadu,
which is already under the National Waterways project, should be
executed. A navigable canal had been in use as a waterway for over one
hundred years before it fell into disuse in the Seventies. The 420 km
long Buckingham canal extends from Peddaganjam in Krishna district of
Andhra Pradesh to Marakkanam near Pondicherry. It passes through the
city of Chennai where it serves as a 31 km long storm water drain. It is
mostly silted up now.
The Ministry of Road Transport and Shipping has proposed to restore it
as a navigable waterway and also extend it further up to Godavari. If it
could be extended southwards up to the Cauvery delta region, a major
part of interlinking of national rivers would have been completed.
As a means of transportation, the waterway is a viable, revenue-yielding
proposition that can be executed in a short time at relatively low cost.
It will also generate huge employment opportunities, mostly to the
unskilled rural labor force. The surplus water from Godavari and Krishna
can be utilized to remove the salinity of the water in the canal since
it links several backwater bodies along the seacoast. A moat-cum-dyke
structure will separate these water bodies and the sea.
Apart from raising groundwater levels in the coastal districts of Andhra
and Tamil Nadu, the extensive Pulicat Lake near Chennai, through which
the canal passes, will solve the drinking water problem of the city
permanently. More importantly, the coastal canal will help reduce the
impact of the invasion of the sea at the time of tsunamis and cyclones.
It will also serve as a super drain whenever the city is inundated.
Linking of Rivers in Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu Government has its own project for linking the rivers in the
State. This again should be patterned after the navigable canal in the
east coast. The rain shadow districts along the Western Ghats could
benefit from this project if the link canal is constructed at the foot
of the hills. Eventually, the canal could be extended northward to link
the rivers flowing down from the mountains in Karnataka, Andhra and
Maharashtra as part of the National Waterways network.
Universal Education and Linking of rivers under the National Waterways
offer instant solution to the problems of poverty, unemployment and low
agricultural productivity. Funds have been allocated and viable schemes
are drawn up. What is needed is collective political will of the rulers
at the Centre and in the States.
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