Kothari Commission (1964-66)
OR
NATIONAL EDUCATION COMMISSION 1964-66
In order to improve the field of education, whenever a committee or commission is constituted in our country, it is only to say that this process has been initiated for the reorganisation and assessment of the lactarial system of the region. After independence, the responsibility of creating a new society in the field of education came upon our teachers and methods of education, but teachers too, in their own problems and in educational systems, were beginning to be many faults.
That is why a clash of teachers, students, administration, curricula and educational systems was seldom encountered. At this juncture the need was felt to solve all problems and re - evaluate education.
Kothari Commission was shaped on 14 July 1964. It absolutely was shaped underneath the position Daulat Singh Kothari.
Daulat Singh kothari was the then chairman of University Grants Commission (UGC).
Kothari Commission was the sixth commission in Asian nation.
The Kothari Commission had a set of seventeen members.
Apart from eleven Indian members, it had members from five alternative countries like USA, U.K, USSR, France and Japan.
Recommendations of Kothari Commission (1964-66)
- Provision of Free and obligatory Education— counseled providing free and obligatory education for kids aged six to fourteen years.
- The Commission counseled adopting a three-language formula at state levels.
- It supposed to push a language of the Southern States in Hindi speaking states.
- It supposed to push Hindi, English and a regional language in non-Hindi speaking states.
- The Kothari Commission counseled promoting regional languages, Indic in addition as international languages, ideally English.
- Education in ethical and religious values — steered creating organized makes an attempt for conveyance ethical education and together with religious values.
- The Kothari Commission counseled providing favourable and sufficient service conditions for lecturers and providing them with the necessary freedom to conduct and publish those findings.
- To push social justice, the Kothari Commission targeted on women education, education of backward categories, education of social group folks, physically and mentally disabled youngsters.
- As Science associate degreed Maths are an integral a part of the expansion of any nation, the Kothari Commission counseled creating Maths associate degreed Science an integral a part of education.
- The Commission suggested reforms to enhance education at University level by paying special attention to postgraduate levell analysis, training, providing adequate libraries, laboratories and funds.
- The structural pattern so suggested by the commission is usually called 10+2+3
In short the structural pattern of education.
- Pre-school education from one to three years ought to even be given.
- General education ought to last for a amount of ten years.
- four years of lower primary, three years of upper primary, three years of lower educational activity.
- Higher educational activity ought to be fastened for two years.
- Degree course ought to be of three years.
- The age of admission to category I shouldn't be less than 6+.
- The first public external examination ought to come at the completion of the first 10 years of schooling.
Features of Kothari Commission
- This commission has ignored Hindi and has spread English and has boycotted Sanskrit.
- The recommendations of the commission are general, which have already been made in the past by the commission constituted.
- The commission has opposed the arrangement of pass and fail.
- Efforts have been made to make arrangements for better performance in the low score.
- The commission has considered education as the true process of life and emphasised the establishment of new objectives.
- Work experience has been prioritised in every field.
- Teachers have been advised good salaries and promotions.
- Education in medical field has been neglected.
Kothari commission reports itself has an encyclopedia.
Merits and Demerits of Kothari Commission
MERITS OF KOTHARI COMMISSION
1. Formulation of Principles for Policy on Education :
The National Education Commission declared education to be the subject of national importance and suggested to spend 6% in place of 2% of the Central budget on it.
It suggested to establish a powerful administrative structure at the Centre and similar structure in the Provinces too.
It presented a uniform education structure for the democratic India.
As a result a uniform education structure was declared for the whole country in both the National Policies on Education, 1968 and 1986.
2. Guidance to the Education Planners :
The National Education Commission pointed out the importance of educational planning and clarified its basic principles.
It clearly Stated that the educational planning should be sequential and time bound and it should be planned on the basis of the present and the future demands and on the basis of the national goals and the availability of the resources.
Keeping in view the demands of the democratic India, its economic condition and the availability of resources,
the Commission suggested-
first, to organise free and compulsory education, within a period of 20 years for the children in the age group 6-14 years,
second to organise secondary: education as a complete unit for the 70% children seeking admission at the secondary level,
third, to prepare the remaining 30% children for higher education and
fourth, to organise higher education for the able and selected youths from amongst this 30%.
These suggestions are as much relevant at present as they were in the past.
3. Broad Aims of Education Consistent with Time :
The Commission first of all determined the general aims of education—
- to increase in production,
- to achieve social equality and national integration,
- to develop democratic values,
- to preserve the culture of the nation and
- to develop the social, moral and spiritual values.
These aims are as much relevant at present as they were at that time.
In the National Policy on Education, 1986 the attainment of national goals was also added to these aims.
4. Comprehensive Thought on Primary Education :
The Commission emphasized on organising free and compulsory education, in the country, for the children in the age group 6 to 14 years.
At the same time,
- It formulated the aims of primary education, proposed curriculum for it,
- Suggested measures to reform the methods of teaching at this level,
- Gave suggestions for its expansion and improvement and
- Suggested measures to check the wastage and stagnation at this level.
These suggestions of the commission are as much relevant at present as they were at that time.
It is also necessary to encourage individual efforts in the organisation of primary education as it is not possible for the Government alone to organise compulsory primary education.
5. Suggestions Regarding Secondary Education Consistent with Time :
The suggestion of the Commission that from the point of view of the population of India and the availability of resources, secondary education should be a complete education for 70% of the general children, is as much relevant at present as it was at that time.
For this it suggested to vocationalise secondary education and to make it a complete unit in itself.
On its completion the children may be able to earn their livelihood and may lead a general life.
Next, whose children should be given which type of secondary education—general or vocational and even in vocational education which vocations should be imparted, for this it emphasized on organising appropriate educational and vocational guidance and counselling at the secondary level.
6. Check on the Expansion of Higher Education and Emphasis upon its Upliftment :
From the point of view of the demand for the highly educated persons in different fields and the availability of resources for their arrangement, the Commission emphasized to restrict the further expansion of higher education and to raise its standard.
This suggestion of the Commission is apt even today as it was in 1965-66.
The expenditure on higher education for a large number of general students increases educated unemployment and it results in the wastage of resources.
In its place, providing higher education to a few talented students help, prepare the best, qualified and capable specialists for different fields and in the organisation of best quality education, within limited resources.
At the same time, the Commission also gave some concrete suggestions to raise the standard of higher education;
- for instance-to provide autonomy to the universities,
- to expand and update the curriculum of higher education,
- to introduce new courses,
- selective admission in higher education,
- to select teachers at the national level and
- to implement the continuous evaluation system.
All these suggestions are as muchi relevant at present as they were in the past.
7. Proper Policy and Organisation of Agriculture Education :
The Commission clarified that India is an agrarian country and 70% of its population thrives on agriculture, therefore, everyone should definitely possess a general information about agriculture.
Moreover, gardening and domestication of animals are pursued by urban dwellers too.
It is therefore quite appropriate to have a general knowledge about it at the primary level.
The idea of the Commission that agriculture should be given a special place in work experience at the secondary level is a proper idea.
The suggestion for the organisation of agriculture education in polytechnic colleges and the organisation of higher education and research work in agriculture in colleges and universities has proved a boon for India.
We have become self-sufficient in the field of foodgrains.
The utility and relevance of all these is hardly disputable in the present context.
The research work in the field of agriculture should be a continuous process.
8. Demand Based Vocational and Technical Education :
The Commission emphasized on organizing region specific vocational and technical education to lessen educated unemployment.
At the same time,
- It also emphasized on updating their curriculum,
- To provide all facilities to these institutions and place
- Equal emphasis on theoretical knowledge as well as practical training.
All these suggestions are as much relevant at present as they were in the past.
9. Emphasis upon Science Education and Scientific Research :
The Commission pointed out the necessity of science education for the modernisation of the country.
It suggested to spend more on higher education of science and scientific research work.
It is because of the implementation of these suggestions that India is progressing in industrial field, marching ahead in space technology, has become a strong competitor in the software field and has become the sixth atomic power of the world.
We have to continuously move ahead in this direction.
10. Proper Suggestion Related to Teacher's Standard and Teacher Training :
The suggestion of the Commission is universally true that unless and until the social and economic status of teachers is raised, this profession will fail to attract able persons in its fold.
It suggested to increase the pay scales of teachers and to improve their service conditions.
At the same time,
It suggested reforms in the teacher training programmes to improve the teachers' educational qualification and teaching skill.
Most of its suggestions like continuous increase in the salary of teachers, payment of dearness allowance to them like the government employees, to provide benefits of G.P.F., insurance and pension to them, to select able persons for the teacher training and to give more importance to practical training in the teacher training programme are of much significance at present as they were in the past.
11. Proper Plan and Broad Nature of Adult Education :
The Commission visualised adult education in a very broad perspective to educate illiterate adults, to sustain the literacy of literate adults and to provide opportunity to the educated adults to increase their educational qualification, and to organise short term education for the interested persons working in various fields to update their knowledge and skills.
In this way, the Commission included both, the contemporary adult education and the continuing education in it.
From our point of view it is necessary for any progressive and developing nation.
At the same time, the Commission also gave concrete suggestions to make the adult education programme a success; for instance-to seek cooperation from the educated youths, teachers and students, gram sevikas, social welfare department and social service organisations, in the adult education programmes; to convert primary schools into community centres; to organise short term education before or after the school time, to organise correspondence courses; to establish permanent libraries and to organise mobile libraries.
12. Emphasis upon the Equality of Educational Opportunity :
Equality of educational opportunity is the demand of democracy.
The Commission placed great emphasis on this and to achieve this it suggested—
- similar curriculum for boys and girls;
- equal opportunity to pursue any course,
- monetary aid to poor and able students;
- Specal economic assistance for the children of backward,
- scheduled caste and scheduled tribe and hilly tribes;
- to make primary education free and the provision of scholarships in secondary,
- Higher and vocational education.
These suggestions of the Commissions in thisi context are of great importance.
Demerits of the Kothari Commission
These are as :
1. Ill Defind Administration :
The Commission on the one hand assigned the right, to prepare educational policies and plans to the Centre and entrusted it the responsibilty of higher education and on the other hand it bestowed the right to organise and to plan education according to the need and resources to the State Governments thereby creating a Dilemmatic situation, both for the Centre and the States.
Next, it though suggested the Central Government to spend 6% of its budget on education but failed to suggest the way how it should be spent.
It also gave vague suggestions regarding the Central and the State Governments, educational responsibilty and the expenditure on education.
The results that instead of supplementing each other's work the Central and the State Governments are going their own way.
2. Jumbled Structure of Education :
The Commission proposed the duration
- of pre-primary education to be 1 to 3 years,
- of primary education to be 4 to 5 years,
- upper primary or junior secondary education to be 2 to 3 years,
- secondary education to be 2 to 3 years,
- graduation education to be 3 years and
- the post graduate education to be 2 to 3 years.
Two defects are observed in this proposed structure, first - it is not clear and
second, it is not uniform for the whole country.
It is the demand of democracy that there should be a uniform structure of education for the whole country.
It is for this reason that a uniform structure of education i.e., 10 + 2+ 3 is accepted in the National Policy on Education, 1986 for the whole country.
3. Mockery in the Name of National Education :
Educationists from different countries were appointed as the members of this Commission, its suggestions were thus bound to be a melting pot of disparate ideas.
Secondly, most of these members were related to higher education, their ideas about primary and secondary education were bound to be different.
Somewhere they have talked about the vocationalisation of secondary education and at other place they have talked about specialization at the higher secondary level.
Somewhere they have talked about implementing the three language formulae and at other place they have talked about organising the education of English, Russian and French at this level.
It seems that there was no sound logic behind these suggestions.
They simply rendered these suggestions as and where they found suitable to them.
4. Unnecessary Educational and Vocational Guidance from the Primary Level :
The Commission emphasized on educational and vocational guidance and counselling, and suggested to organise it from the primary level.
But when a common, free and compulsory primary education is to be organised for everyone the need for guidance and counselling automatically becomes redundant.
And now when a 10 years core curriculum is proposed for the whole country in the New National Policy on Education, 1986, there is no need for such guidance and counselling at this stage.
Whatever may be the general educational problems of the students at first ten years stage, such as, coming late to school, taking no interest in learning some subject or performing some activity, not completing home work in time, etc. may be solved by the teachers with love, sympathy and cooperation.
5. Contradictory Ideas about secondary Education :
The Commission has presented very contradictory ideas about secondary education.
At one place it has suggested to bifurcate the secondary education into literary and vocational categories and Stated that 50% of the average students will be given admission in the vocational category so that they may earn their livelihood after its completion and the rest 50% students will be given admission in general category so that they may enter higher education after its completion.
And at other place the Commission mentioned that the secondary education will be a complete education for 70% students.
These two suggestions are opposite to each other.
Not only this, at one place it speaks about the vocationalisation of secondary education and at other place it suggests to provide secondary level vocational education in polytechnic schools.
6. Defective Language Policy :
The Commission talked about making the education of only mother-tongue compulsory at the primary level and the education of mother-tongue along with the Union language (Hindi) or co-language of the Union English at the higher primary or the junior secondary level.
At the secondary level the study of 3 languages under the 3 language formula is made compulsory and for the third language it made the study of either English, french, Russian or any classical language compulsory.
It is opposed to the basic objective of 3 language formula.
At the same time, it also expressed its view that the education of English language should be properly organised.
Indirectly it is the policy to perpetuate the English language.
It is very harmful for the independent India.
7. Unnecessary Suggestion for the Establishment of Senior Universities and Autonomous Colleges :
The Commission gave many suggestions for the upliftment of higher education.
Most of its suggestions have proved very effective. But its idea to develop some universities as senior universities and to suggest that their standard should be higher in comparison to other universities, is nothing but to establish double standard with respect to the standard of higher education.
It was good that this suggestion of the Commission was not accepted otherwise the existence of other universities would have been jeopardized.
Similarly, it suggested to convert some high standard colleges into autonomous colleges.
It also failed to give the desired result and was abandoned.
8. Contradictory Ideas about the Expansion of Education :
The Commission when discussed about the school education, higher education or any type of special education, it always emphasized on their expansion and upliftment.
Similarly when it talked about the equality of educational opportunity, it Stated to make any type of education available at any level, to everyone.
But immediately the inadequacy of resources emerged when the question of student enrolment and manpower came before it.
Another interesting fact is that it first of all spoke about organising free and compulsory primary education for the children in the age group 6-14 years and thereafter said that only the interested students should be given admission at the upper primary level.
This again shows the contradiction between these two suggestions.
9. Contradictory Views about Other Aspects of Education :
If one thinks comprehensively about the suggestions rendered by the Commission one finds that it has presented contradictory views on other aspects of education too.
Somewhere it Stated that in future, the medium of higher education will be the regional languages only and at other place it Stated that English will remain the medium of higher education in science andi technology.
In the context of pay scales of the teachers, it initially advocated the principle of same salary for same work but when it proposed the pay scales for the different categories of teachers it proposed different pay scales for the college and university teachers doing the same work.
And the most contradictory suggestion of the Commission was that whatever it talked about the expansion and upliftment of any type of education at any level, it never talked about the scarcity of resources.
It seemed India was overflowing with affluence. But, the moment it expressed its views about the student enrolment and manpower it seemed as if India lacked resources even to implement a modest scheme of free and compulsory primary education for the children in the age group 6-14 years.
The report of this Commission was couched in a literary language of highest order and contained proposals which in the first instance were quite mesmerising but were hardly based on the ground of reality of India.
Impact of the National Education Commission
- The National Policy on Education was prepared on the basis of the recommendations of the National Education Commission, 1964-66 and was declared on 24 July, 1968.
- And thus the implementation of the recommendations of the National Education Commission started.
- Efforts began to implement the 10 + 2+ 3 structure of education in the whole country and NCERT prepared the core curriculum for the first 10 years of education.
- The study of 3 languages according to the 3 language formula; study of science and technology for the modernisation of the country and the work experience were made compulsory.
- In some provinces the curriculum of the first 10 years of education was prepared on this basis and was implemented.
- In some provinces different types of vocational courses were also started at the + 2 level, but they failed to succeed.
- Degree course in higher education was changed from 2 years to 3 years duration.
- Concrete steps were taken for the expansion and upliftment of higher education, vocational, technical and management education.
- In 1969, National Service Scheme (NSS) was started in the universities and colleges.
- At the same time reforms began in teacher education and the programmes of adult education were made more extensive.
- Implementation of the suggestions which this Commission gave for the equality of educational opportunity also began.
- The second remarkable thing in this context is that the National Policy on Education, 1986 was also prepared on the basis of the National Policy on Education, " 1968.
Report of kothari commission
The commission prepared a report on 18 subjects and 692 pages of its Suggestions and recommendations and submitted on 29th June 1966 to the government of India in the presence of the then minister of education, shri M.C. chhagla.
Evaluation of kothari commission
Any object, idea or action is evaluated by some basic criteria education is a social reaction. Any idea connected with it must be judged on the basis of utility of the prevailing circumstances and future of the society. The recommendations of the commission were to be assessed by the circumstances prevailing in India 1965-1966 and its future demands. We shall, therefore, judge India on the basis of the circumstances and the needs of the future.
Demerits of kothari commission
The demerits of kothari commission are:
- Most of the recommendations of the commission are idealistic and impractical, without implementation.
- Even Suggestions on women 's education by the commission are not very useful.
- The commission has completely bypassed basic education.
- The commission neglected Indian religion and philosophy without Sanskrit in the matter of religious education.
- The commission has suggested the use of Roman script for Indian languages, while the Roman script has many shortcomings. Our devanagari script would have been more suitable in place of the Roman.
- The suggestion of the commission for academic and professional guidance at the primary level is necessary as there is no question of professional guidance at this level.
- When educationalists from India and abroad were appointed in the commission, their Suggestions were bound to be patched. Again it was all related to higher education. Their ideas about primary and secondary education were, therefore, bound to be varied.
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