Click to play videoNew Delhi: With "expansion, inclusion and excellence" as his guiding factors to revamp Indian education, Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal on Thursday announced a slew of measures, including optional Class 10 Board exams, accreditation agencies for schools, free education and private sector involvement in primary learning.
Sibal, who announced as many as 40 legal, policy and administrative initiatives for the first 100 days of the UPA Government, made a strong pitch to "de-traumatise education" and said there was no need for a Class 10 Board examination.
CNN-IBN spoke to the Minister on his 100-day plans. Excerpts from the interview:
CNN-IBN: De-traumatise education, that seems to be the buzzword of your ministry's 100-day action plan on education. What spurred you to do this? And what is essentially wrong with the system?
Kapil Sibal: At the moment the school system is overburdened. The child and the parents go through trauma because there is Class X and Class XII exams and in between there are other exams also. After school children carry a heavy burden of books back home while mothers pour over them to teach their children. This is not the way forward in the education sector, we really need to de-traumatise it.
CNN-IBN: That sounds good but surprisingly many of the students we spoke to aren’t as thrilled about having the 10th Board exam being scrapped. In fact they say it makes them more competitive.
Kapil Sibal: Those who prefer to take the exam can go for the 10th Board, if they so want. But then there are children who don't want it, and they can because ultimately it is about moving from class 10th to class 11th in the same school, why should they have to go through a Board exam?
CNN-IBN: Mr Sibal, there is complete merit in your argument but there are lakhs of students in rural India who take the tenth standard as a benchmark and then move to vocational course. So passing tenth is still a big benchmark in rural India.
Kapil Sibal: Good, good. For example if a child has to move from class tenth to pre-university then he has to take the Board exam because there is no other way to move to pre-university. But if you're in the same school and you know what you want to do, supposing that the parent and the child and the teacher thinks that a child should move to Humanities, they already know that, then why should they do an exam? There can be a different method of assessment.
CNN-IBN: The system has been around for a long while. How difficult is it going to be to convince schools and boards across the country?
Kapil Sibal: This is not me alone, there is an expert body which has already proposed this that we should be re-looking at the tenth Board exam and we should be re-looking at curriculum framework. These are experts in India who have said this. This is not a minister, who suddenly one fine morning gets up and says this is what I want to do. This is not what should be done in the education sector. There is a lot of work and a body of work that has gone into this and a lot of thinking by experts that has gone into this.
CNN-IBN: Your other proposal for one unified board seems equally radical for a country that has 30 state boards. We have already heard from many states who aren’t comfortable with this idea.
Kapil Sibal: No, no. I never talked about a single grading system. I talked about single grading in class nine and tenth in CBSE.
CNN-IBN: But it is this proposal that has many up in arms. We have heard from the West Bengal education ministry and even in Karnataka saying this is not the Centre’s jurisdiction.
Kapil Sibal: There is no opposition from the media. This is the first time that we are hearing some opposition.
CNN-IBN: You have also called for more foreign direct investment in Indian schools but many foreign investors will have trouble complying with our quota system. Is that a challenge?
Kapil Sibal: No, no. I don't think this is an issue yet. We have not even had the Bill passed in the Cabinet. As and when the framework of the Bill is set, we will have a full discussion on it like what are the systems in place to attract foreign investment in education.
There are many countries in the world which allow universities to be set up. Take Malaysia for example, which has many foreign universities which impart education at half the cost. For example an Australian university, which is very good, functioning in Malaysia imparts the same degree at half the cost to Malaysian students, so why should our children be deprived of that?
CNN-IBN: What about a timeframe Mr Sibal? How workable is your plan in 100 days?
Kapil Sibal: Well you ask me after a 100 days, you will find out how workable it was.
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