MINISTER OF STATE IN THE
MINISTRY OF HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT
(DR. SATYA PAL SINGH)
(a) & (b) It is true that India has one of the largest systems of Education in the World, in terms
of number of enrolments, institutions and teachers. The Government of India has initiated major
reforms in the education sector to improve the quality and access to education.
Government has started many Institutes of National Importance ( INIs )and Central Universities
( CU ) so that they would emerge as centres of educational excellence both at the national and
international level. However, the infrastructure and the teaching-learning systems in many of
these institutions is yet to be built as per acceptable standards. This is true of all new institutions
– IITs / IIMs/ IISERs/ NITs/CUs / SPAs. Also, the infrastructure in the older INIs started in
1960s requires renewal and reconstruction as per global standards. To ensure this, a major
initiative “Revitalising Infrastructure and Systems in Education (RISE)” with a total
investment of Rs. 1,00,000 Cr in the next four years, for building the Indian institutions of higher
learning so that they take a pride of place in the global institutions has been launched.
The Higher Education Financing Agency (HEFA) has been set up by Government to mobilise
the funds from market and service the requirements of the CFIs, to be serviced by the internal
revenues generated by the institutions, and to cover the interest portion, suitable grants would be
released to the institution.
(c) to (f) The Government of India has initiated major reforms in the education sector to
improve the quality and access to education. Aimed at expanding access to quality education,
new premier higher education institutions have been opened across the country, marking the
highest ever such expansion in the history after Independence.
SWAYAM MOOCs portal ( (Study Webs of Active learning for Young Aspiring Minds) is an
indigenous MOOCs portal that provides high quality education - anyone, anytime, anywhere at
no cost- has been made operational. The portal has courses by the best teachers in the country
and offers video lectures, e-reading material, discussion forum and assessment system - resulting
in award of credits to the successful learners. Sofar, more than 1000 courses are made available
and more than 33 lakh users are registered in this forum. Upto 20 % credit transfer into the
academic record of students, is allowed now, for the courses taken on the SWAYAM portal.
To reach high quality educational content to the most backward areas using satellite
communication, 32 DTH channels have been made functional, under SWAYAM Prabha
programme. These channels air 4 hours of new content every day.
The initiative of National Digital Library (NDL ) is a virtual repository of learning resources
with a single window search facility. It has already brought together 15 million digital books and
journals and 31 lakh learners are using this facility. It supports all academic levels including
researchers and life-long learners, all disciplines, all popular form of access devices and
differently abled learners.
Unnat Bharat Abhiyan (UBA ) is a new initiative to make use the knowledge base in the higher
educational institutions for plugging technology gaps in the rural areas. In this year, 750
institutions are being selected on challenge mode. This is expected to enrich rural India by way
of customising existing technology as per local needs and also by improving the implementation
of existing government schemes.
Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya National Mission on Teachers and Teaching (
PMMMNMTT ) scheme has been launched in Dec, 2014, to address the issues of supply of
qualified teachers, attracting talent into teaching profession, raising the quality teaching in
schools and colleges.
Ek Bharat Shreshtha Bharat programme has been conceived by Hon’ble PM to promote
mutual understanding between States & UTs in India which have diverse cultures, traditions,
languages etc., through a process of sustained mutual engagement between the people. All States
and UTs are paired with each other for a period of one year, after which the pairing would
change. The objective is to break the inhibitions arising from diversity in culture through
participative appreciation and engagement by people so that a spirit of oneness is created in the
process for the nation.
Under Swachh Bharat programme the Department recognised the huge role that has to be
played by HEIs in promoting Swachhta in the form of an attitude of zero tolerance to anything
unhygienic. It has initiated Swachhta Rankings of Higher Educational Institutions and Swachhta
Action Plans have been prepared.
Global Initiative of Academic Networks (GIAN ) is an initiative launched on 30th November
2015 to garner best international knowledge and experience into the country’s higher education
so as to enable Indian students & faculty to interact with best academic and industry experts from
across the world. GIAN courses are short duration courses and as on date, 1075 courses have
been conducted, in which more than 40,000 students gained enriched academic inputs and
knowledge. These courses are also video recorded for subsequent use and some are also telecast
live, depending upon the available infrastructure.
Government has embarked on building 20 Institutions of higher learning - 10 public and 10
private institutions as “Institutions of Eminence” (IoE ), so that they are related among the
global best institutions. These institutions to be declared in April, 2018, will have complete
academic and administrative freedom and the public institutions will be given 1000 crore fund in
next 3 years.
The best performing Institutions with high accreditation would be given autonomy in
functioning. The Graded Autonomy Regulation introduced recently would provide liberal
regulatory oversight so that the institution can plan for new courses and would strive for
excellence.
IMPRINT India is an effort to direct research in the premier institutions into areas of social
relevance. 10 such domains have been identified which could substantially impact the living
standards of the rural areas . More than 2600 research proposals have been submitted by
scientists in these areas.
The Uchchtar Avishkar Yojana (UAY ) has been launched to promote industry specific needbased
research so as to keep up the competitiveness of Indian industry in the global market. It is
proposed to invest Rs. 250 crores every year on identified projects. The Industry is expected to
contribute 25 % of the project cost.
Prime Minister Research Fellows (PMRF) scheme is launched to support 1000 bright
undergraduate students every year, for direct admission in the research programmes in the
reputed institutions like IISc, IITs. The fellowship carries a lot of social recognition and it ranges
from Rs 70,000 to 80,000 per month for 5 year period.
Smart India Hackathon initiative is to promote innovation in the students by encouraging out
of the box solutions for common problems faced by the society at large. In the first edition held
in 2017, more than 40,000 students have participated to solve more than 600 problems. In 2018,
the scope has been expanded to Hardware area also.
National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) is the biggest ranking exercise launched
in 2015, in which more than 3,500 institutions participated. The first edition of India Rankings
2016 were released in April, 2016. The India Rankings 2018 , the 3rd edition, is expected to be
released on 3rd April, 2018. The India Rankings is one of the biggest efforts for bringing in
accountability and transparency in the higher educational institutions. The ranks are released in
the various categories of institutions namely Universities, Engineering, Management, Pharmacy
etc..
Rashtriya Uchchatar Siksha Abhiyan (RUSA) scheme has been given extension by Cabinet
recently to provide more assistance for infrastructure to Universities and Colleges, creation of
Model Degree colleges, Cluster universities, Upgradation of autonomous colleges and
Vocationalisation of higher education.
Under the Technical Education Quality Improvement Programme Phase III (TEQUIP-III)
focus has been given to the backward States in central tribal belt and north-eastern region. Under
this Rs. 2,600 Cr would be spent for improving the quality of teaching and research in the
engineering institutions.
With a view to promoting autonomy for the premier institutions, the IIM Act has declared them
as Institutes of National Importance and gave complete autonomy for deciding their
administrative and academic matters, without any Govt interference.
In accordance with the policy that education should be accessible for everyone, the National
Scholarship Portal has been started. Apart from this, the Vidyalaxmi portal provides one-window
clearance for the Education Loans with Interest Subvention.
SCHOOL EDUCATION
In order to focus on quality education, the Central RTE Rules have been amended on 20th
February, 2017 to include reference on class-wise, subject-wise Learning Outcomes. The
Learning Outcomes for each class in Languages (Hindi, English and Urdu), Mathematics,
Environmental Studies, Science and Social Science up to the elementary stage have, accordingly,
been finalized and shared with all States and UTs. These would serve as a guideline for States
and UTs to ensure that all children acquire appropriate learning level.
A National Achievement Survey (NAS) was conducted on 13th November, 2017
through which the learning levels of around 22 lakh students of Classes III, V and VIII from 1.10
lakh schools across 700 districts in all 36 States and UTs were assessed. This competency based
assessment was based on the Learning Outcomes developed by the NCERT. District and State
report cards for NAS 2017 have been released by this Department and are available on MHRD
website. Through NAS it is for the first time that the teachers have a tool to understand what
exactly the child should be learning in various classes, how to teach this through activities and
how to measure and ensure that children have reached the required level.
NAS for class X was conducted on 5th February, 2018 in a sample of around 15.5 lakh
students in 45,337 schools. The performance of students was assessed in five major subjects i.e.
English, Mathematics, Science, Social Science and Modern Indian Languages (MIL), based on a
district wise sampling of schools, to enable States to identify gaps in learning at district level and
design strategies to address these gaps.
The RTE Act, 2009 was amended in 2017 to ensure that all teachers acquire the
minimum qualifications prescribed under the Act by 31st March 2019 to reinforce the
Government''s emphasis on improvement of quality of elementary education. The National
Institute of Open schooling (NIOS) has been entrusted to conduct this training through Open
Distance Learning (ODL) mode.
The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education (Second Amendment) Bill,
2017 was introduced in the Lok Sabha on 11th August, 2017 to provide for a regular
examination at fifth class and eighth class at the end of every academic year. If a child fails in
the said examination, he shall be given additional instruction and granted opportunity for reexamination
within a period of two months from the declaration of the result. In case the child
fails in the second attempt, the appropriate Government may allow schools to hold back a child
in the fifth class or in the eighth class or in both classes, in such manner and subject to such
conditions as may be prescribed. The appropriate Government may also decide not to hold back
a child in any class till the completion of elementary education.
The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has decided to make class X Board
Examination compulsory from the academic year 2017-18.
A four year B.Ed. integrated programme with multiple pathways and specialization for
pre-primary, elementary, secondary and senior secondary teachers will be introduced from the
academic session 2019-2020.
In pursuance of the proposal of the Union Budget, 2018-19, to treat school education
holistically without segmentation from pre-nursery to Class 12, this Department has prepared
an Integrated Scheme for School Education by subsuming the three Centrally Sponsored
Schemes of SSA, Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA) and Teacher Education
(TE) extending Central support across all levels of school education.
The National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) is undertaking
an exercise to rationalize the curriculum/syllabus/subject contents from Class I to XII with the
objective of all round development of students. Suggestions have been invited from various
stakeholders till April 6th, 2018.
The Department plans to support ‘Operation Digital Board’ in all schools ( from 9th
standard onwards ) and colleges as a joint effort of Centre, States, CSR and community
initiatives to provide good quality education by effective use of technology and convert every
class room in the country (from class IX and above) into a digital class room.
Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA) was launched by Government of India in
March, 2009 envisaging inter-alia provision of a secondary school within a reasonable distance
of any habitation and to improve quality of education imparted at secondary level by making all
secondary schools conform to prescribed norms, removing gender, socio-economic and disability
barriers etc. In 2013, secondary education the schemes of ICT, vocational education, Girls Hostel
and IEDSS were subsumed under the umbrella of RMSA. Under the scheme, 12682 new schools
and 37799 existing schools for strengthening have been sanctioned so far.
e-pathshala has been developed by NCERT (National Council for Educational Research and
Training) for showcasing and disseminating all educational e-resources including textbooks,
audio, video, periodicals and a variety of other print and non-print materials. So far, 3,062 audios
and videos, 650 e-books (e-pubs) and 504 flip books have been made available on the portal and
mobile app.
Government has taken various steps to expand digital literacy in rural India. Ministry of
Electronics and Information Technology is the nodal ministry for this. Ministry of Human
Resource Development also launched ‘Vittiya Saksharata Abhiyan’ for creating awareness
among people about digital economy and cashless modes of transactions, by involving all higher
educational institutions.
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