National Education Policy pushes for primary education in mother tongue, Sanskrit to be offered at all levels

The new National Education Policy (NEP) approved by the Union Cabinet on Wednesday aims to ensure that the medium of instruction until at least class 5 remains in the mother tongue of the child, HRD Minister Ramesh Pokhriya Nishank said. 

A single regulator for higher education institutions, multiple entry and exit options in degree courses, discontinuation of MPhil programmes, low stakes board exams, common entrance exams for universities are among the highlights of the new education policy. 

The Cabinet also approved changing the name of the HRD Ministry to Education Ministry.

"Since most of the learning happens in the mother tongue, we ensured that wherever possible, the medium of instruction until at least Grade 5, but preferably till Grade 8 and beyond, will be the home language/mother-tongue/local language/regional language," Nishank said in a tweet. 

The HRD Ministry said in a press release that the policy has emphasized mother tongue, local language or regional language as the medium of instruction at least till Grade 5, but preferably till Grade 8 and beyond. 

Sanskrit will be offered at all levels of school and higher education as an option for students, including in the three-language formula. Other classical languages and literature of India also will also be available as options. 

"No language will be imposed on any student. Students to participate in a fun project/activity on ‘The Languages of India’, sometime in Grades 6-8, such as, under the ‘Ek Bharat Shrestha Bharat’ initiative. Several foreign languages will also be offered at the secondary level. Indian Sign Language (ISL) will be standardised across the country, and national and state curriculum materials developed, for use by students with hearing impairment," the ministry said. 

"This is the first education policy of the 21st century and replaces the thirty-four year old National Policy on Education (NPE), 1986.  Built on the foundational pillars of Access, Equity, Quality, Affordability and Accountability, this policy is  aligned to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and aims to transform India into a vibrant knowledge society and global knowledge superpower by making both school and college education more holistic, flexible, multidisciplinary, suited to 21st century needs and aimed at bringing out the unique capabilities of each student," the ministry added.

"NEP 2020 aims to increase the Gross Enrolment Ratio in higher education including vocational education from 26.3% (2018) to 50% by 2035. At least 3.5 crore new seats will be added to higher education institutions," HRD Higher Education Secretary Amit Khare said at a press briefing.

"The policy envisages broad-based, multi-disciplinary, holistic Under Graduate education with flexible curricula, creative combinations of subjects, integration of vocational education and multiple entry and exit points with appropriate certification. Under Graduate education can be of 3 or 4 years with multiple exit options and appropriate certification within this period," he said.

"Affiliation of colleges is to be phased out in 15 years and a stage-wise mechanism is to be established for granting graded autonomy to colleges. Over a period of time, it is envisaged that every college would develop into either an autonomous degree-granting college, or a constituent college of a university," Khare said.

The government said that the NEP 2020 has gone through unprecedented consultations and has been formulated after a process of consultation that involved nearly over 2 lakh suggestions from 2.5 lakh Gram Panchayats, 6600 Blocks, 6000 ULBs, 676 Districts. 

"The MHRD initiated an unprecedented collaborative, inclusive, and highly participatory consultation process from January 2015," the ministry said. 

In May 2016, ‘Committee for Evolution of the New Education Policy’ under the Chairmanship of former Cabinet Secretary TSR Subramanian submitted its report. Based on this, the Ministry prepared ‘Some Inputs for the Draft National Education Policy, 2016’.  

In June 2017 a ‘Committee for the Draft National Education Policy’ was constituted under the chairmanship of former ISRO scientist K Kasturirangan, which submitted the Draft National Education Policy, 2019 to HRD Minister on May 31, 2019.  

The Draft National Education Policy 2019 was uploaded on MHRD’s website and at ‘MyGov Innovate’ portal eliciting views, suggestions and comments of stakeholders, including public.