NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY

Volume II • JANUARY 2017

Dr. Radhakrishnan Commission Report

Accordingly, in this University Day Special Edition of Economic and Public Policy Journal, we present abstracts from the Report.
The entire Report can be accessed here.

http://www.teindia.nic.in/Files/Reports/CCR/Report%20of%20the%20University%20Education%20Commission.pdf

1. The Impact of Political Change - Great as were the changes that had taken place in the political and economic conditions of
Indian society in the years that preceded the transfer of power on August 15, 1947, considerable as was the progress in
education during that period, they are less great than the changes that have been crowded into these few months of
freedom. The academic problem has assumed new shapes. We have now a wider conception of the duties and
responsibilities of universities. They have to provide leadership in politics and administration, the professions, industry and
commerce. They have to meet the increasing demand for every type of higher education, literary and scientific, technical
and professional. They must enable the country to attain, in as short a time as possible, freedom from want, disease and
ignorance, by the application and development of scientific and technical knowledge. India is rich in natural resources and
her people have intelligence and energy and are throbbing with renewed He and vigour. It is for the universities to create
knowledge and train minds who would bring together the two, material resources and human energies. If our living
standards are to be raised, a radical change of spirit is essential.

2. Universities as the Organs of Civilisation - He indeed must be blind who does not see that, mighty as are the political
changes, far deeper are the fundamental questions which will be decided by what happens in the universities. Everything is
being brought to the test of reason, venerable theologies, ancient political institutions, time-honoured social
arrangements, a thousand things which a generation ago looked as fixed as the hills. If India is to confront the confusion of
our time, she must turn for guidance, not to those who are lost in the mere exigencies of the passing hour, but to her men of
letters, and men of science, to her poets and artists, to her discoverers and inventors. These intellectual pioneers of
civilization are to be found and trained in the universities, which are the sanctuaries of the inner life of the nation.

In simpler conditions of life, in primitive societies, the leader can follow the urge of his instinct and take us to the scene of
his vision. In the complex organisation of modern life, any reform requires careful thought and planning. Our leaders must
be capable of intellectual analysis and imaginative insight.

3. Intellectual Adventure - We must give up the fatal obsession of the perfection of the past, that greatness is not to be
attained in the present, that everything is already worked out and all that remains for the future ages of the world is
pedantic imitation of the past. When we are hypnotised by our own past achievements, when all our effort is to repeat a
past success, we become fetish worshippers. If our cultural life is to retain its dynamism, it must give up idolatry of the past
and strive to realise new dreams.

We should think with the young men in the Latin poem that nothing is done while anything remains to do. All that man has
yet done is very little compared to what he is destined to achieve. The present which moves backwards and forwards, which
is a summary of the past and a prophecy of the future, is hallowed ground and we who tread on it should face it with the
quality of reverence and the spirit of adventure. Universities are the homes of intellectual adventure.

66
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

4. An Integrated Way of Life - A life of strenuous endeavour for human betterment is not possible, if we are not persuaded that
life has a meaning. Many of our popular writers today seem to be possessed by the one desire to escape from the world of
meaning and teach us the essential purposelessness of life. They make us believe, with a good deal of cleverness and
sophistry, that life is infinitely complicated and totally inexplicable. Many of our students are taught to assume that free-
will and personal responsibility are illusions, that human beings are conditioned almost wholly by their physical make-up
and the society in which they live, and that the only sense that the religious statements make is emotional and subjective.
This is a generation which knows how to doubt but not how to admire, much less to believe. This aimlessness, this
indifference to basic issues, is to no small extent, responsible for the decline of standards, for the fading of ideals, for the
defeat of human endeavour.

The purpose of all education, it is admitted by thinkers of east and west, is to provide a coherent picture of the universe and
an integrated way of life. We must obtain through it a sense of perspective, a synoptic vision, a samanvaya of the different
items of knowledge. Man cannot live by a mass of disconnected information. He has a passion for an ordered intellectual
vision of the connections of things. Life is one in all its varied manifestations. We may study the factual relations of the
different manifestations but we must have knowledge of life as a whole. It cannot be a collection of distracting scraps but
should be a harmony of patterns. The subjects we study must be taught as parts of a connected curriculum.

5. Wisdom and Knowledge - Our ancient teachers tried to teach subjects and impart wisdom. Their ideal was wisdom (irfan)
along with knowledge (ilm), jnanamvijnanasahitam. We cannot be wise without some basis of knowledge though we may
easily acquire knowledge and remain devoid of wisdom. To use the words of the Upanisad, we may be the knowers of texts
(mantravit) and not knowers of self (atmavit). Plato distinguishes between factual information and understanding. No
amount of factual information would make ordinary men into educated or 'virtuous' men unless something is awakened in
them, an innate ability to live the life of the soul.

The strength of the new 'faiths' among intellectuals is partly due to their claim to explain the universe. By professing to
interpret all human activity in terms of a single thesis, they give to the modern educated men a sense of assurance and
certainly formerly provided by religion. Since education is both a training of minds and a training of souls, it should give
both knowledge and wisdom.

6. Aims of the Social Order - We must have a conception of the social order for which we are educating our youth. We know
what Hitler did in six years with the German youth. The Russians are clear in their minds about the kind of society for which
they are educating and the qualities required in their citizens. They tried to remake man in a new image. Our educational
system must find its guiding principle in the aims of the social order for which it prepares, in the nature of the civilisation it
hopes to build. Unless we know whither we are tending, we cannot decide what we should do and how we should do it.
Societies like men need a clear purpose to keep them stable in a world of bewildering change.

8. Value of the Individual - The basis of democracy is the belief in the inherent worth of the individual in the dignity and value
of human life. It repudiates the totalitarian principle in all its forms, viz., that the individual as such is useless and that he
must be either destroyed or converted into an efficient unit in the power- machine of the State. Democracy affirms that
each individual is a unique adventure of life.

9. Education as Growth - The function of education is the guidance of this adventure to the realisation of the potentialities of
each individual in the face of the actual world of men and things. It aims at the development of the individual, the discovery,
training and utilisation of his special talents. Like all living organisms, the individual grows by the impulse of his own self-
development. The natural tendency of the child is to grow into maturity. From complete dependence on others the child
has to grow into relative independence. The function of the teacher is to assist the growth by stimulation and guidance. The
growth is advanced by the acquisition of knowledge and skills. These later are intended to set free and develop the
possibilities of human individuals. Education is not a discipline imposed from above on an apathetic if acquiescent nature.
It is a process of leading up the inward nature to its fulfilment. All true development is self-development.

The process of education as growth is continuous and lifelong. It is said that a pupil gets a fourth of his education from his
teacher, another fourth by his own intellectual effort, a third fourth from his fellow students and the rest in course of time
through life and experience. We learn from the teacher, by ourselves, from one another and from life or experience.
Education is not always formal. Where we have a number of keen young men as members of an intellectual community,
they educate one another through the daily give and take. Experience is a great teacher. We learn daily and hourly from our
home, from our community, from the press, the radio and the movies. All life is experience and therefore education.

67
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

10. Physical Education - Human beings are psycho-physical in nature. They have bodies which obey certain definite laws of
growth.

11. The Triune Character of the Human Mind - Human beings are not all built in the same way. They are of different types,
reflective, emotional or active, though they are not exclusively so. They are distinguished on account of the dominance of
emphasis of the one or the other. Cognition, feeling and will, though logically distinguishable are not really separable in the
concrete life of mind. These three sides which answer to the familiar distinction of jnana, bhakti and karma, express
themselves through theoretical contemplation, aesthetic enjoyment and practical activity. These are found in different
proportions in different individuals.

The true educator should understand the psychological make-up, the svabhava of the pupil and adapt his teaching to the
mind of the pupil. The difficulty is to discover the true inward being of each individual. In the same family, we have
individuals of different temperaments. With a view to their individual defects and prescribe remedies against the particular
diseases to which they are inclined, the teachers should discover the tendencies and weaknesses of the individual pupils,
encourage their desirable aptitudes and cure the weaknesses to which they are inclined.

In a well-planned educational system, opportunities will be provided at every level to the pupils for the exercise of their
reflective powers, artistic abilities and practical work. The sensitive teachers will be able to find out the mental make-up of
the pupil, whether he has in him more of the reflective or the artistic or the practical bent. If he is reflective, he must find out
whether he has philosophic or scientific, mathematical or linguistic talents; if he is artistic, he must discover whether he has
taste for literature or music, painting or sculpture; if he is practical minded, he must notice whether he is a great
experimenter or is mechanically minded. These varying tendencies can be discovered at the Secondary School stage and if
proper guidance is provided, much wastage at the later stages will be avoided. Secondary Schools are expected to offer
many different kinds of vocational training.

It is wrong to think that the more intelligent go to the universities and the less intelligent to technical schools. Success in a
technical school requires as high an intelligence as success in a purely literary or scientific course. It may be of a different
kind even as pupils are of different kinds, meditative or mechanical, scientific or artistic. Bookishness or the manipulation
of concepts is not the only kind of intelligence. The new Secondary Schools should insist on the equal dignity and
importance of the different courses they offer.

12. Nature, Society and Spirit - There are three types of existence, which are interrelated - the natural, the social and the
spiritual. The content of teaching may be classified under three heads - our relation to things or nature; our relation to men
or society, our relation to values or the world of spirit.

Every pupil should have knowledge of the physical world in which he lives. It is, of course, not possible for everyone to be a
specialist in each of the sciences, but by the time he leaves college, every student, even if he is a student of humanities,
should be familiar with the general principles governing his physical environment. Instruction in the technological forces
shaping the world is also essential. Technology is continually transforming our environment. All progress in industry from
the Stone Age is but a record of the transformation of our environment by the triumphs of technology.

Society - Everyone should know something of the society in which he lives, the great forces that mould contemporary
civilisation. History, economics, politics, social psychology, anthropology, belong to the group of social sciences. Whatever
may be our specialised field, a general understanding of our social environment and of human institutions is essential.

Spirit - The purpose of humanities is to enable man to understand his inner aspirations and ideals. The study of the
language and the literature of our mother tongue should occupy the first place in general education. Language incarnates
the genius of the people which has fashioned it. Every word, every phrase conveys some idea of men and women as they
ploughed their fields, tended their homes, built their towns or sailed their ships. We get into the spirit of our people by
acquiring control over the language. Literature quickens and enlarges the human spirit. It appeals to the imagination of the
child and imparts a sense of the inexhaustible richness of human personality and the immense complexity of human
relationships.

68
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

Arts, like music and painting, help to educate our emotions and impart a certain grace in living. Men of taste will abhor
ugliness, squalor and vulgarity. Any course of education intended to prepare men and women for the business of living
should include philosophical studies, which deal with conduct and the ends of life. However well-informed we may be in
general knowledge, however technically efficient we may be in our special vocations, if we are not acquainted with the
roots of our past, if we do not have an understanding of what is called the 'wisdom of the ages' our education falls short of
its true ideals. It would indeed be very strange if we neglect philosophy, art and literature at a time when civilisation is in
danger, not from any poverty of material resources or the power to use them but from want of the knowledge and the spirit
to use them rightly. Our present condition is in part due to the failure of our education to cope with moral and spiritual
uncertainties. Human values are not a part of nature in the sense in which stones and plants are and yet they can be studied
scientifically. If intellectual fragmentation and anarchy are to be avoided, the student must acquire a frame of reference
which will give meaning and direction to his college work as he moves from class to class to study different subjects. The
different studies should be treated as parts of a whole. There must be an intellectual integration of his varied knowledge.

13. Natural Sciences, Social Studies and Humanities - The divisions of subjects into sciences, social studies and humanities are
not exclusive. It will be wrong to assume that science is amoral or indifferent to values. Science is not to be taught as
something external to man. It is one of the greatest of the creations of the human spirit. It provides the material basis of the
good life. Its aim is not only utility or success but the pursuit of truth. Its essence is careful observation of facts, rigid
conscientiousness in inference and elimination of personal prejudice and passion. Its method is to follow the argument
where it leads and its goal is to see things as they are. Its ideal is the same as that of philosophy, the vision of reality. Till
recently, scientific studies were treated as philosophical disciplines. Even now "Philosophical Transactions" of the Royal
Society deal with scientific investigations. Similarly when we study language, the relations of words to meanings, the
construction of sentences, the method we adopt is that of science. Panini's work on Grammar (6th century B.C.) is
unsurpassed as a scientific study of the facts of language.

Broadly speaking, the three divisions deal with facts, events and values. Their methods are different, though they are used
in all studies in different degrees. While scrupulous attention to fact is the method of science, imaginative insight is also
needed for scientific work. Mere heaping of data is not knowledge. In the realm of values, objective analysis of complex
situations is necessary for proper appreciation. In history, we need a judicious blend of factual observation and judgment.
Whatever be our subject of study, we must be able to observe carefully, think effectively and use our judgment properly.
Anyone who wishes to live intelligently in the modern world should have some knowledge of selected materials from the
three fields of (1) Science and Technology (2) Social studies including History (3) Humanities including language and
literature, fine arts, ethics, philosophy and religion. Our education is incomplete if it is limited to the knowledge of the
masterpieces of thought and imagination, ignoring altogether other expressions of the human spirit, the exact sciences.

14. Unity of Mind and Interdependence of Knowledge - If education is to guide the individual towards the comprehension of
the art of life, it must energise his whole being and give him ideas of nature, society and values. Human mind is a unity and
all knowledge is interdependent. In a sense, every study should excite and satisfy the different mental powers. It must give,
the pupils intellectual vision, aesthetic enjoyment and practical power.

15. Education must look to the whole man. Karl Marx says, "The education of the future will, in the case of every child over a
certain age, combine productive labour with education (unterricht) and athletics (gymnastik) not merely as one of the
methods of raising social production but as the only method of producing fully developed human beings. On this question
of learning through doing, Marx and Gandhi agree. Whether we are being introduced to the delights of literature, or the
wonders of science, or the pride of craftsmanship, our whole being must be at work. Only then is education turned into joy
triumphing over weariness and pain. While a general understanding of the scientific method of the history of our society
and the world and literature which feeds our imagination and stabilises our emotional life is to be regarded as a part of
general education for all, professional education trains the students for competence in an occupation. Education has
among others, this double aim of preparing for a particular vocation and also for citizenship in a democratic community.
These two ends are not exclusive of each other. If knowledge is power, all education is both pure and professional. The list of
subjects mentioned in the Chandogya Upanisad, 8th Century B.C., includes literature, history, philosophy, religion,
mathematics and astronomy, practical arts, military science, rgvedam, yajurvedam, samavedam, atharavadam,
itihasapuranamvedanamvedampitryam, rasim, daivam, nidhim, vakovakyam, ekayanam, devavidyam, brahmavidyam.
bhutavidyamksatravidyam, naksatravidyam sarpadevajanavidyam.

69
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

16. Inwardness of Freedom - There are not many today who hold that the concern of the college is primarily with the intellect
and little, if at all, with the fashioning of character, the building of personality. While the conservation and advancement of
learning is a dominant purpose of the universities, they should also aim at raising the personal quality of its members and
make them seek the good life. A free society is composed of free citizens and men are not free simply because they are
freed from external restraints. True freedom is inward, a function of mind and spirit. This inner fearlessness is the
affirmation of human individuality. The recognition that a human being is a free moral agent with the right and capacity to
choose between truth and error, good and evil, is the essence of freedom. We may make a wrong choice but true
democracy concedes to us the right to choose wrongly.

A human being lives in the world of nature but apprehends a world of values. We can break him on the wheel, burn him at
the stake, bury him alive in a concentration camp or crucify him, but we cannot make him lie or steal or betray the cause he
believes in. Our education should encourage the development in its members of fearlessness of mind, strength of
conscience and integrity of purpose. If human life is to remain human, it must deepen and live by a sense of moral
obligation. Without moral freedom, there can be no true democracy. Freedom and justice in the world depend on there
being enough men and women who say "We will obey God rather than men". For the sake of the soul, we may sometimes
have to abandon the world.

17. Education as Initiation into a New Life - Education, according to the Indian tradition, is not merely a means to earning a
living; nor is it only a nursery of thought or a school for citizenship. It is initiation into the life of spirit, a training of human
souls in the pursuit of truth and the practice of virtue. It is a second birth, divitiyamjanma.

18. Inadequacy of Education as Adjustment to Society - It is of course true that we should mould students to a pattern that is
sanctioned by the past if society is not to become discontinuous. Education is a means by which society perpetuates itself.
In 1852, Newman defined the function of the university thus: 'If a practical end must be assigned to a university course,
then I say it is training good members of society.' No system of education could be directed to the weakening of the State
that maintains it. But education is also an instrument for social change. It should not be its aim merely to enable us to adjust
ourselves to the social environment. We must train people not merely to be citizens but also to be individuals. Many
systems of education tend to transform the individual, who might otherwise seek to rise above the type, into the
representative of the community. On such a scheme, we cannot get leaders, who with new values transform the
community. There is no stimulus to individuality, to being in any respect distinct or different from one's surroundings. The
aim of education should be to break ground for new values and make them possible.

19. Flexibility of the Educational System - The institutions of democracy must be flexible, capable of adaptation to the changing
needs and conditions of men. We must make modifications whenever we feel that changes are necessary to realise more
effectively the ends of individual development and social welfare. Educational systems are built for a time and not for all
time. There are no changeless ways of educating human nature. A curriculum which has vitality in the Vedic period or the
Renaissance cannot continue unaltered in the 20th Century. Realising that the vision of free men in a free society is the
living faith and inspiring guide of democratic institutions, we must move towards that goal adapting wisely and well to
changing conditions.

20. Social Justice - Even as we cannot break up the human person into separate mental faculties, we cannot separate the
individual from society. Social justice is the foundation of States and it demands that we create a society which is freed from
the evils which it is within human power to banish. If all men are entitled to all equal chance to be free from want, fear and
ignorance, we cannot sit quiet and contented when millions of our fellowmen continue to live in poverty, disease, hunger
and ignorance. If we are to demonstrate, not by words, but by deeds, that the democratic way of life is superior to the
totalitarian, we must raise the material standards of life and increase national productivity by the larger use of scientific
discoveries and technical applications. After the October Revolution of 1917, Soviet Russia, wiped out illiteracy, raised the
educational level of the masses, built and equipped scientific institutes and laboratories and transformed the country with
new industries and a new type of agriculture.

22. Agricultural Education - The vast majority of our people are engaged in agriculture and our position in regard to food
production is pathetic. While Great Britain which is highly industrialised has attempted progressively to reduce her imports
of food from overseas and increase her own food production, India, where 70 per cent of the people are engaged in
agriculture, imported 1 1/2 million tons of food grains in 1946, 2 million tons in 1947, 3 million tons in 1948 and threatens to

70
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

import 41 million tons in 1949 at a cost of 200 crores of rupees. While we with 70 per cent of our population working on
farms are unable to produce enough food even at the subsistence level for our population, the United States of America of
whose working population only 13 per cent work on farms, provides food at a high level not only for her entire population
but for a large part of the rest of the world. The output of rice per acre in India is about 1,000 lbs. only as against 2,500 lbs. in
China and 3,000 lbs. in Japan. What is possible in China and Japan must be possible in India. We have neglected the
countryside, disrupted the village communities and destroyed rural initiative. If we wish to increase our food production,
we must train the farmers and utilise the results of scientific research in agriculture in the fields.

23. Technological Education - Our leaders have drawn up ambitious plans for the industrialisation of our country involving
expenditure of crores of rupees. They wish to improve communications, develop systems of irrigation, distribute electricity
to the villages. They have large schemes for the improvement of health and sanitation. If these schemes are to be realised,
we have to increase the number of professional colleges, agricultural, medical and engineering to produce the requisite
number of graduates and set up throughout the country technical schools which will supply the much larger number of
technicians needed for the purpose. For a fuller realisation of the democratic principles of justice and freedom for all, we
need growth in science and technology. The presence of the suffering millions, tired, discontented, mentally inefficient is a
challenge to us. Where human action can remove the evils, inaction has the guilt of vice.

24. Rural Development - The industrialisation of the country should take into account the fact that the large majority of our
people live in villages. As far back as 1830, Sir Charles Metcalfe wrote about the village communities in these words: "They
seem to last where nothing else lasts. The union of the village communities, each one forming a separate little state in itself,
has, I conceive, contributed more than any other cause to the preservation of the people of India through all revolutions
and changes which they have suffered, and it is in a high degree conducive to their happiness and to the enjoyment of a
great portion of freedom and independence. I wish, therefore, that village constitutions may never be disturbed and I
dread everything that has a tendency to break them up". They have been broken up. We have to revive them today and
make them, as far as possible, self-sustaining. Cottage industries and small co-operatives require to be developed and
machines to lighten the labours of men living in cottages. "If we could have electricity in every village home, I shall not mind
villagers plying their implements and tools with electricity," said Gandhi.

We need heavy large scale industries for power, mining, metallurgy, oil, machinery and machine tools, automobiles,
locomotives, shipbuilding, aircraft, heavy chemicals, pharmaceuticals. These are to be located by the State in centres
selected for the availability of raw materials and local labour conditions. Our economy must be a decentralised one
supported by agriculture and village industries, supplemented by the necessary large-scale industries which are worked,
not for the profit of a few industrialists, but for the general welfare.

25. The Place of the Machine - The machine should be treated as a natural accessory to man's social development. It is the tool
of the free individual, and not his master. It must not become the servant of powerful self-seeking individuals and groups.
Under proper control and an equitable system of distribution, it can supply the basic needs of food, shelter and clothing to
every individual and release him from the burden of life for his own proper function of relating himself to his source, to his
fellowmen, and to the forces of his natural environment.

26. Defects of Exclusively Scientific and Technical Education - Now that scientific discoveries and technological applications
have altered our physical environment profoundly in the space of a few generations, our social habits and institutions
require to be readjusted. We have grown strong in the mastery of the physical world but are very weak in our ability to
manage and direct the social forces that shape our lives. It is a false belief that scientific pre-eminence is the only basis of
national security and welfare.

27. Need for Social Studies and Research - To impart correct social vision is an essential part of true education. While graduates
in law, medicine and engineering acquire specialised information and technical skill, they should also be inspired by high
social aims as no groups can pursue their private ends without regard to the social consequences of their activities. We do
not work in a social vacuum. No man should expect to benefit from social order and progress without contributing to it.
Individual freedom entails social responsibility. Our students must be educated in the ethical values and the concept of
human relations on which our political system rests, in the structure and processes of government. They must learn to
know the imperfections of actual procedures and institutions through which government works. We must widen and
deepen their social conscience and indicate how, though reason is set up as the final arbiter in human relations, the appeal
to emotion and prejudice is more common among us than the appeal to reason. We should not be tempted by the prestige

71
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

of natural sciences and their immediately tangible results to give them a disproportionate place in our teaching
programmes and research budgets. There is at least as much research to be undertaken in the social sciences as in the
natural sciences. The pattern of inquiry and the canons of validity in social studies are somewhat different from those
employed in natural sciences. The warning against the insistence on the same standards of precision in all fields is as old as
Aristotle. "Discussion will be adequate if it has as much clearness as the subject matter admits of, for precision is not to be
sought for alike in all discussions. It is the mark of an educated man to look for precision in each class of things just so far as
the nature of the subject admits; it is evidently equally foolish to accept probable reasoning from a mathematician and to
demand from a rhetorician scientific proofs.”

28. Training for Leadership - Training for leadership in the professions and in public life is one of the central aims of university
education, which is difficult to realise. President Truman remarked: "Our national policies must be administered by men of
broad experience, mature outlook and sound judgment. But there is a critical shortage of such men - men who possess the
capacity to deal with affairs of State". He went on, "We have been much less successful in obtaining persons with broad
understanding and an aptitude for management. We need men who can turn a group of specialists into a working team and
who can combine imagination and practicability into a sound public programme. Men trained for this kind of administrative
and political leadership are rare indeed". If it is the function of universities to train men and women for wise leadership,
they must enable young men and women to read with insight the records of human experience as they are expressed in
world's literature, to know the nature and consequences of ethical values, to sense the meaning of the social forces
operating in the world today and comprehend the complexities and intricacies of life in all its immensity, physical, social and
spiritual. Sciences supply us with the tools of civilisation but the guidance for their use does not come from them. Our
obsession with the temporal, our passion for ever increasing velocity of movement require to be tempered by attention to
the world of values, the 'unchanging forms' of Plato. We are building a civilisation, not a factory or a workshop. The quality
of a civilisation depends not on the material equipment or the political machinery but on the character of men. The major
task of education is the improvement of character. Education must carry out at appropriate levels a combination of general,
scientific, artistic and technical education for students of varying abilities and occupational objectives.

29. University Autonomy - Freedom of individual development is the basis of democracy. Exclusive control of education by the
State has been an important factor in facilitating the maintenance of totalitarian tyrannies. In such States, institutions of
higher learning controlled and managed by governmental agencies act like mercenaries, promote the political purposes of
the State, make them acceptable to an increasing number of their populations and supply them with the weapons they
need. We must resist, in the interests of our own democracy, the trend towards the governmental domination of the
educational process. Higher education is, undoubtedly, an obligation of the State but State aid is not to be confused with
State control over academic policies and practices. Intellectual progress demands the maintenance of the spirit of free
inquiry. The pursuit and practice of truth regardless of consequences has been the ambition of universities. Their prayer is
that of the dying Goethe: "More light" or that of Ajax in the mist "Light, though I perish in the light".

Professional integrity requires that teachers should be as free to speak on controversial issues as any other citizens of a free
country. An atmosphere of freedom is essential for developing this 'morality of the mind'. The respect in which the
Universities of Great Britain are held is due to the freedom from governmental interference which they enjoy
constitutionally and actually. Our universities should be released from the control of politics.

30. The Spirit of Science and Social Conservatism - The active principle of science is discovery and every new discovery involves
modification of hitherto accepted knowledge and so has to overcome the inertia of what is already established. When we
adopt the scientific method of thought, we demand that we reach conclusions from tested data only and our conclusions
are tentative, since our data may be enlarged. Readiness for change marks the scientific attitude while resistance to change
is normally the attitude of defenders of tradition. The general aversion to change common to all static societies is hostile to
scientific progress.

31. Liberal Education - All education is expected to be liberal. It should free us from the shackles of ignorance, prejudice and
unfounded belief. If we are incapable of achieving the good life, it is due to faults in our inward being, to the darkness in us.
The process of education is the slow conquering of this darkness. To lead us from darkness to light, to free us from every
kind of domination except that of reason, is the aim of education.

72
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

32. The Democratic Way of Life - Democracy as a way of life and not a mere political arrangement requires of its adherents a
jealous regard not only for their own rights but equally for the similar rights of others. It is based on the principle of equal
freedom and equal rights for all its members, regardless of race, religion, sex, occupation or economic status. Education is
the great instrument of social emancipation by which a democracy establishes, maintains and protects the spirit of equality
among its members.

33. Freedom of Conscience - If we develop the social temper of democracy, we will have confidence in one another. We will
allow freedom of conscience to others as it is our faith that others like ourselves are competent to work out their own
salvation.

34. Equality of Opportunity - Equal opportunity does not mean identical opportunity for all. It means the equal availability of
education for every qualified person. Our system must provide for every young person education to the extent that he can
profit from it and of a character best designed to assure the maximum development of his nature. It must of course
recognise differences of gifts and interests. Article I of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights says: "All human beings
are born free and equal in dignity and rights". They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one
another in a spirit of brotherhood". Education confined to those who come from nobility, landed gentry or professional
classes is suited to a society built on an economic and social hierarchy of classes. In a democratic society, the opportunity of
learning must be open not only to an elite but to all those who have to carry the privilege and responsibility of citizenship.
Education is a universal right, not a class privilege. The educational attainments of our people are far below what is
necessary either for effective individual living or for the satisfactory maintenance of society. For the great majority of our
boys and girls, the kind and amount of education they may hope to get depends not on their own abilities, but on the
economic status of their family or the accident of their birth. The earnings of a very large part of our population are so low
that they find it difficult to have even the barest necessities of physical existence. Low family income together with the
rising costs of education is an almost impossible barrier to college education for many young people. There is no relation,
however, between the ability to profit from a college education and the ability to pay for it. Speaking of the mathematical
genius, Ramanujan, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru said in his Discovery of India: "Ramanujan's brief life and death are symbolic
of conditions in India. Of our millions, how few get education at all, how many live on the verge of starvation, of even those
who get some education, how many have nothing to look forward to but a clerkship in some office on a pay that is usually
far less than the unemployment dole in England? If life opened its gates to them and offered them food and healthy
conditions of living and education and opportunities of growth, how many among these millions would be eminent
scientists, educationists, technicians, industrialists, writers and artists, helping to build a new India and a new world?" We
cannot let our potential human resources go undiscovered and undeveloped. In distribution of educational opportunity,
there should be no caprice, prejudice, favouritism, special privilege, or other arbitrary action. In general, each person
should have educational opportunity of the kind and to the extent that is suited to his capacity and interest and which
represents his fair share of the total educational resources. Application of this principle may be adjusted to the needs of
society and to humane considerations. Should society need more technicians and fewer clerical workers, educational
opportunity may be shifted accordingly. Exceptional ability is socially so valuable that it may be given exceptional
opportunity. Special training for retarded persons may be justified by the need to make them self-sustaining and not a
burden to society. Humane considerations may lead to special educational provisions for the blind and other handicapped
persons. Wise administration of educational resources must rest on the integrity and judgment of the State.

35. Economic Barriers - Owing to economic difficulties, many young people are not getting the chance to which they are
entitled and the nation is deprived of a large amount of potential leadership. M. science and scholarship, industry and
commerce. If we are to give substance and actuality to the claim of equality we profess, we must devise a system in which
qualified individuals are not prevented by economic barriers from attaining the kind of education for which they are suited
by their aptitudes and interests. The President's Commission on Higher Education in America "recommends that in publicly
controlled institutions there be no tuition or other required fees for the thirteenth and fourteenth school years,
irrespective of whether they are offered by a 2-year or a 4-year college; and that fees above the fourteenth school year be
reduced at the earliest possible moment to the level prevailing in 1939." If we are to enable even the poorest to obtain not
merely some but the best education they are capable of, we must organise a large and generous system of scholarships
which will provide a ladder from the bottom to the university along which any child can climb to the limit of his capacity.
These scholarships should cover not only tuition costs but costs of board, lodge and other living needs.

73
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

36. Communal Ratios - The principle of equality in regard to educational rights is set forth in Section 23 of the Constitution: "No
minority whether based on religion, community or language shall be discriminated against in regard to the admission of
any person belonging to such minority into any educational institution maintained by the State". Unfortunately in some
Government, not University, Colleges in South India, there is what is called a "rationing of seats" among members of
different communities. The fundamental right is the right of the individual, not of the community. Every young man must
have an equal chance with others to make the most of his abilities. To curtail the chance to learn for members of particular
groups is inconsistent with the Fundamental Right. It would tend to increase the stratification of our society. To insist on
quotas for communities would be to assume that the nation is composed of separate and self-sufficient groups, which is a
negation of our national ideal and democratic principle.

Discrimination practices generate tensions and the spiritual damage caused by them is not measurable. Education should
not be used for creating or deepening the very inequalities which it is designed to prevent. Progress for the nation requires
that access to higher education should be determined by the interest and ability of the student. There is much to be said for
the suggestion that the information about caste and religion should not be asked for from candidates for admission to
colleges and universities.

37. Assistance to Backward Communities - We cannot banish social situations by democratic phrases. Our Constitution has
abolished communal electorates, privileges and weightages for all except the scheduled castes. We are in great sympathy
with the anxiety of these scheduled castes and backward communities to raise their cultural level. ...Backwardness is the
result of a long period of unequal opportunity and it should be remedied as speedily as possible. We must provide them
with additional assistance which will enable them to give their children equal educational opportunities with others in the
nation. By expanding the facilities in the colleges and increasing their number, we will be able to move towards equalisation
of educational opportunities. But to deny to the most talented members of the nation, Brahmin or non-Brahmin, Christian
or Muslim, opportunities for self-development is not only unjust to them but is unfair to the nation which is deprived of
high class professional ability and social competence. Besides, we live in a competitive world in which mind yields itself only
to an ascendancy of mind.

In the present conditions of our society, the needs of justice to the members of the scheduled castes and the communities
declared to be backward by the government of the Province or the State can be met by reserving a certain proportion of the
seats in any college maintained by the State for qualified students of these communities and throwing open the rest of the
seats to members of all communities by open competition. The percentage of reservation shall not, however, exceed a
third of the total number of seats. The principle of reservation may be adopted for a period of ten years.

38. Extra-Curricular Activities - Fraternity refers to the need for fraternal concord and goodwill among the people of India and
the world. It can be fostered in educational institutions among the members of different communities, if we do not
emphasise differences of caste, community and religion. In the hostels and playgrounds and unions, students should be
trained in the democratic way of life. The extracurricular activities of the college provide avenues through which students
could participate in making decisions and carrying on joint undertakings. Habits of mutual trust and cooperation and
qualities of fair play, patience, disinterestedness, consideration for others, are acquired through practice. Students cannot
learn these if the institutions are run on authoritarian lines. We cannot teach the lessons of freedom by the methods of
servitude. Students should be encouraged to participate in the social and cultural activities of the areas in which the
colleges are situated so that they may become alive to the needs of the society in which they live.

39. Indiscipline - We hear a great deal today of indiscipline among students. The university has split into two groups. The world
of teachers is separate from that of the students. The students adopt a trade union attitude to the authorities. They have
little respect for their teachers and little concern for academic standards. They are convinced that the teachers are less
informed than they about the illness of the society in which we live. A restless youth, discontented with its older
generation, conscious of talents and cramped by lack of opportunity, which draws simultaneously towards and away from
the Indian pattern of life, eager, thoughtful, suspicious, requires to be treated with understanding by the colleges and the
universities. The teacher who shows in the classroom or outside any interest in the problems which are alive for the
student, has a following. The young people are in desperate need of assistance. Out of the mass of individuals who have
enrolled in a college, we have to build a community. The university surroundings do not provide adequate opportunities for
corporate life.

74
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

40. The Residential System - In ancient times, the teacher and the pupil shared a common life. They shared the same simple
food and life and in the process was established a close relation between the teacher and the pupils. Education was
regarded as a co-operative enterprise. The imperceptible action of the teachers' character, devotion to learning and the
spirit of dedication on the growing minds of the pupils was the most valuable part of any education. The teacher not only
imparts instruction but transmits the power of spirit. Compulsory residence within college walls which is required in many
universities of the world assumes this invaluable interaction between the matured character of the teacher and the still
unformed mind of the pupils. The absence of this personal relationship is to no small extent responsible for the increasing
indiscipline. Numbers swamp "humanity" and make education mechanical.

41. College a Community Centre - The College should be a community centre and not merely a classroom or a hotel. In the
dormitories, in student government, in clubs and organisations, in the varied social, recreational, intellectual life of the
college, there are unique opportunities for the practice of the democratic way of life. They should be regarded as an integral
part of the educational programme. Members of the teaching staff may participate in them actively, not to dictate or
supervise but to advise and help, to make available to youth their wide knowledge and mature experience.

42. National Discipline - There has been in recent years, a deterioration of the moral fibre. Many of the students as well as
teachers are lacking in moral purpose and integrity. Many of those in power are in the grin of greed, selfishness and hatred.
In our visits to the colleges and the universities, we were impressed by the need for improvement in national character and
discipline. Universities ought to be examples to the nation, in fair dealing and decent behaviour. Some of the universities,
we regret to say, are not models of decency and dignity. We can suggest only improved machinery giving less scope for
intrigue and rackets. But no improvement of machinery can do much without a change of spirit. University personnel must
develop a greater sense of social responsibility for educational and national progress, a preference for quality over
quantity. The teachers can do much to raise the tone of the universities. It is in educational institutions that we can train
character, build personality, by the discipline of body, intelligence and will.

43. The Need for Culture - What holds a society together and gives the individual balance and perspective is the possession of
culture. Culture is intellectual alertness, receptiveness to beauty, humane feeling, social enthusiasm. As the result of the
vast expansion of the area of knowledge and the diversification of its content, the aim of teaching has become almost
exclusively specialisation. It is the normal feature in professional colleges. Even in colleges for liberal arts and sciences, the
tendency is to specialise and prepare for advanced study in one or the other special field. If society is not to disintegrate into
an aggregate of individual specialists, we should endow the youth with a central core of values, transmit to them a cultural
heritage. It alone can serve as a cohesive force in a society which is getting splintered by overspecialisation. It will confer a
unity and consistency of aim on specialised vocational courses and make for a more abundant personal life and a freer
social order.

44. The Un-Indian Character of Education - One of the serious complaints against the system of education which has prevailed
in this country for over a century is that it neglected India's past, that it did not provide the Indian students with a
knowledge of their own culture. It has produced in some cases the feeling that we are without roots, in others, what is
worse, that our roots bind us to a world very different from that which surrounds us. A British historian of Indian education
observes:-"Our education has done far less for Indian Culture than for the material and political progress of India. She looks
to our Schools and Colleges for equipment in the struggle for existence; for the secret of happy living, vivendi causae, she
looks elsewhere."

45. Cultural Unity of India - Nations are not made chiefly by traders and politicians. They are made by artists and thinkers, saints
and philosophers. National unity and progress require a deeper foundation than political and economic arrangements. It is
the life of spirit that has shaped and unified our collective existence and has been the real bond of oneness among the
Indian people. After centuries of stress and conflict, India has gradually evolved a common civilisation, a collective
consciousness which embraces wide varieties of temperament, tradition, ways of thought and belief. Our people belong to
different provinces, speak their own languages, preserve their own habits and customs. There are sharp differences of
temper, tradition and dialect. Despite all these, there is a fundamental unity which binds the people together as members
of one society with the same cultural loyalties.

75
 NMIMS JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC POLICY
Volume II • JANUARY 2017

Indian culture is like a palimpsest in which new characters do not entirely efface the old. In a single social pattern, fragments
of different ages are brought together. It would be impossible to think of an India where no Moghuls ruled, where no Taj
was built, where no Macaulay wrote his Minute on education. Indian culture is like a living organism growing in richness and
content. Primitive cultures are marked by extreme conservatism where social groups follow the same path of custom and
convention with irrational persistence. Living cultures are dynamic and maintain their cultural pattern by a continuous
effort of individual and social discipline.

76