Plan for Policy Formulation
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: November 03 2015 -

The Ministry of Human Resource Development had launched an unprecedented collaborative, multi-stakeholder and multi-pronged consultation process for formulating the New Education Policy and the same should be welcomed with a critical gaze.

Following the multi-pronged process, a Drafting Committee for framing the New Education Policy has been constituted. The Chairman of the Drafting Committee is TSR.

Subramanian, Former Cabinet Secretary and the four members are: Shailaja Chandra, former Chief Secretary, NCT of Delhi; Sewaram Sharma, former Home Secretary, NCT of Delhi; Sudhir Mankad, former Chief Secretary, Gujarat and Prof JS Rajput, former Director, NCERT.

The National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA), New Delhi will act as its Secretariat.

The Committee is expected to submit the Draft National Education Policy as soon as possible but not later than 31st December, 2015.

Along with the draft education policy, the Committee will also submit a Framework for Action.

According to reports, the three-pronged consultation process included online, grassroots and national level thematic deliberations.

The Ministry said that over 26,500 suggestions have been received online.

It has also been reported that institutions and regulators like UGC, AICTE, NCTE, AIU, NCERT, CBSE, IIAS, NLMA, NAAC, NUEPA, IGNOU, IITs, IIMs and Central Universities have held detailed discussion on identified themes with participation of renowned academicians, experts, practitioners, NGOs, civil society organisations, student & teacher representative bodies, industry associations and stakeholders in different Ministries of Government of India.

Consultation process was one of the agenda in the meeting of Central Advisory Board on Education (CABE) held on August 19 last.

Views of all States and members of CABE were invited on the consultation process and the themes and all States have been requested to undertake the consultation process and complete the same within the defined timeframe.

Minister of Human Resource Development Smriti Irani has also held six zonal meetings in Eastern, Central, North-Eastern, Western, Southern and Northern Zones covering all States and Union Territories in September-October 2015 which were attended by Education Ministers and officials of the States.

It is not clear whether or not the respective zones have already submitted their suggestions in the form of reports.

While, the task of the Drafting Committee for framing the New Education Policy has been set, one is not sure how the new policy envisions capturing the essence of variegated knowledge and nurtures the human resource potentials of the different regions of the country.

Any framework for action oriented plans can be launched only after the actual formulation of the New Education Policy.