Importance of Basic Education in Present System of Education
Back to: Contemporary India and Education – Unit 3
Education is an individual’s dynamic force and plays a highly influential role in a person’s mental, emotional, social, physical, creative, spiritual, and ethical development. It helps an individual to go through various experiences and implement these experiences in creating a meaningful life. According to Plato,
“Education is the capacity to feel pleasure and pain at the right moment; it develops in the body and in the soul of the student all the beauty and all the perfection which he is capable of.”
According to Article 45 of the Directive Principles of State Policy,
“The State shall endeavour to provide, within ten years from the commencement of the Constitution, for free and compulsory education for all children until they attain the age of 14 years.”
India has over 1.5 million schools with an enrolment of around 260 million students. There is an estimate of 751 universities and 35,539 colleges across the country. Having one of the most advanced frameworks of education, India, nonetheless, still has room for improvement. Indian education can be categorized as private and government education with a ratio of 5:7. India strives to offer education to its citizens by making education compulsory up to a certain age based on the framework of the National Policy of Education. During independence, India constituted 14% of literacy but now, there is a fivefold increase in literacy.
The importance of basic education in the present system of education is as follows:
Acquisition of Knowledge
Education fosters the acquisition of new knowledge and skills required for individuals to develop successfully.
Personal Development
Education helps in the development and improvement of various areas of an individual which is required to help them become a responsible member of the society and contribute successfully to the same.
Life Skills
Individuals must be adept at various life skills for which learning various subjects and getting an education is necessary so that they can grow up to be self-sufficient individuals.
Employment
Individuals need to find a job so that they can earn a living which is possible when they get an education that prepares them to enter the work front and secure their careers.
Moral Values
Education is necessary for the development of moral and ethical values. It enables individuals to differentiate the good from the bad and enables them to have a positive perspective of the world and life.
Stability
Education helps individuals lead a stable and secure life where they can find jobs that entertain their skills so that they can have a secure future ahead of them.
Better Citizens
Education is necessary for enabling individuals to become better citizens of the world and contribute to society.
According to the Dictionary of Education (C.V. Good, 1973), education is,
“The aggregate of all the processes by which a person develops abilities, attitudes and other forms of behaviour of practical values in the society in which s/he lives; the social process by which people are subjected to the influence of selected and controlled environment (especially that of the school), so that they may obtain social competence and optimum individual development”.
