STATUS OF MUSLIM COMMUNITY AND EDUCATIONAL ISSUES OF THE URDU LINGUISTIC MINORITY

Abstract

The Urdu Language is linked with Muslim Community. The lower status of this language can be studied through study of backwardness of the Muslim Community. The educational status of this community is examined in the light facts available in census 2001 and Sachar Committee report 2006. The constitutional provision made by nation and efforts of the national governments are also laudable. All these are discussed at length and necessary observations are also given. The government of India programmes like Operation Black Board, District Primary Education Programme, Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan have been instrumental in improving the educational status in India. Even after such provisions by the government, the language and community are not progressing. The authors discuss few of the most core and general points, which need urgent attention. It is expected that this paper will open new vistas of educational research in the field of education of Linguistic and Religious Minorities.

Keywords: Muslim, Urdu Linguistic Minority

Introduction

“No man can walk briskly with crippled legs,

No animal can run fast with lamed limbs,

No vehicle can reach destination with punctured tyres,

No nation can progress with backward community”.

For progressive / developing country like ours, informed, developed citizens are as essential as the developed infrastructure. Hence, the overall development of all sections of the society is important for the progress of the nation. But, it is observed that Muslims are also lagging behind in many areas like SC/ST communities.

Background of Muslim Minorities

The census data of 2001 reveal that Muslims are the largest minority in India and constitute 13.4% of the total population. The states of west Bengal (25.2%), Kerala (24.7%), Assam (30.9%), Uttar Pradesh (18%), Bihar (15.9%), Karnataka (12.2%), Delhi (11.7%) and Maharashtra (10.61%) are the states, that have Muslim population which is more than 10% of state population. Apart from this the Muslim population has its presence even in other states too. This shows that the Muslim population is scattered all around the nation.

Table showing distribution of population according to Socio-Religious Classes (SRCs)

All India 2004-05

State	Population – 2000 (Millions)	Population 2001 %	Hindus			Muslims			Other Population 2001 %
			% SC/ST	% OBC	% General	Population 2001 %	% OBCs	% General
All India	1028.6	80.5	31.2	43.0	25.9	13.4	40.7	59.3	6.1

The data reveals that the 13.4% of Muslim population is a large number which needs attention during policy planning just like SC/ST, who constitute 31.2% of the national share.

27% of Muslim population is of below 10 years in age (Census 2001) i.e. now in 2009 it is estimated that 50% of Muslim population may be below 20 years in age. This is a productive school and college going age, which needs proper education, training, inculcation of values like national integration, communal harmony, universal etc.

Indian population is predominantly rural, so also the Muslim population. But, the level of urbanisation is higher in case of Muslims when compared with the population of India as a whole. This may be because of the availability of small share of fertile lands in the villages. The Muslim population is on a move towards the urban areas for their livelihood. This signifies low economic conditions of Muslim community. The Muslim community suffers from various social needs and issues. The community has raised various issues such as Education, Reservation, Employment, Security, Infrastructural Facilities, Minority Educational Institutions, Credit Facilities and Welfare Schemes with the concerned government authorities.

On the literacy aspects Muslims of states like Kerala, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh have more than 70% of literacy (2001 census) among Muslims. This means that there is a large population of this community who lacks literacy.

Mean years of schooling of children aged 7-16 years in 2001 census indicates that only Kerala and Tamil Nadu have means above 5, which indicates most of the students at least complete lower primary school in these states. This also indicates that the Muslims of other states lag behind in the formal education.

The Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) for the grades 1-5 at all India is over 95% and that for 6-8 it is 61 percent. Proportion of children aged 6-14 years enrolled by Socio-Religious Classes - 2004-05 shows that Kerala, Jammu and Kashmir, Karnataka, Delhi, Maharashtra, Orissa and Chhattisgarh have percentage more than 90. This indicates that the children of remaining 21 states are failing in achieving the enrolment drive for Universalisation of Elementary Education for minorities under various schemes such as DPEP and SSA. It is the same case for age grades 6-8 years.

Facilitation by state of India for linguistic and religious Minorities Education

The constitution of India has given Equal opportunities on Right for All Citizens. The Major Provisions are extended to minorities through Article 14, Article 15, Article 21, Article 25, Article 26, Article 29, Article 30, and Article 350A. The articles which list about the educational prospectus are as under,

Article 29: Protects Minorities’ right to conserve the language, script or culture.

Article 30: Provides for the protection of the interests of Minorities by giving them a right to establish and administer educational institutions of their choice. The state is directed not to discriminate against minorities’ institutions in granting aid.

Article 350A: Directs the state to provide facilities for instructions in the mother tongue at the primary stage of Education.

Prime Minister of India has also taken up various welfare measures for the upliftment of Minorities. The opportunities extended for enhancing education of the Minorities is listed in the following paragraphs.

(1) A certain percentage of the ICDS projects have been started in blocks/villages with a substantial population of minority communities to ensure that the benefits of the scheme are equitably available to such communities also.

(2) The Kasturba Gandhi Balika vidyalayas have also been started in villages/localities having a substantial population of minority communities.

(3) Central assistance is being provided for recruitment and posting of Urdu language teachers in primary and upper primary schools.

(4) The Central Plan Scheme of Area Intensive and Madarsa Modernization Programme provides basic educational infrastructure in areas of concentration of educationally backward minorities and resources for the modernization of Madarsa education. This programme is being further strengthened.

(5) Schemes for pre-matric and post-matric scholarships for students from minority communities has been formulated and implemented.

(6) The Government is making efforts to provide all possible assistance to Maulana Azad Education Foundation (MAEF) to strengthen and enable it to expand its activities more effectively.

In addition to this the national government has been continuously striving for provision of better educational facilities to all sections of the society. Various programmes were launched after framing of the new national policy of education in 1986. Few of the programmes will be discussed in the subsequent paragraphs. It is a general observations that the minorities could not make use of all these facilities for betterments of their community. In other words the government also failed to take these facilities to the deprived sections of the society. The major educational interventions include Operation Black Board, District Primary Education Programme and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan.

Operation Black Board (1987)

This operation was formulated with an assumption that the improvement in school environment would increase the enrolment rate, retention rate and attainment levels of primary school children. The three interdependent components in the scheme were provision of at least two reasonably large rooms that are usable in all weathers, with a deep veranda along with toilet facilities for boys and girls separately; provision of at lest two teachers, as far as possible, one of them a woman, in every primary school; and provision of essential teaching learning materials. The scheme prescribed above mentioned minimum level of facilities for all primary schools with a view to ensure improvement in school environment. The scheme has realized its goals and became foundation step for the commencement of District Primary Education Programme (DPEP).

District Primary Education Programme (DPEP)

DPEP covered 219 districts from 18 states. This programme started various Civil works that includes construction of School buildings, Resource centres, Classrooms and Other works like repairs, drinking water, toilets etc. Village Education Committees / School Management Committees were set up for monitoring and facilitating school activities. Students enrolment increased, new schools opened and teachers were recruited. The other interventions include training of teachers, community members, opening of Alternative schools. The Pupil Teacher Ratio (PTR) decreased, Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) and Net Enrolment Ratio (NER) increased during the DPEP period. It was also observed that the strength of female student and teachers also increase. Overall repetition rates decreased this programme period. This programme however, targeted selected schools of selected districts in limited states. Thus, these efforts were further strengthened in subsequent movement called Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA).

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA)

The SSA was brought in for Universalisation of Elementary Education. The scope of DPEP programme was extended both in geographical coverage and academic years i.e. all the schools of India were to be covered under this programme from grade 1 to 8. This programme was brought in to achieve few primary goals. Following table examines achievement of these objectives especially with reference to the minorities’ education.

Table showing examination of SSA objectives vis-avis achievement for minority communities

Sl. No	Goals of SSA	Assessment
1.	All in school by 2005	There are many children who are not attending school.
2.	Complete 5 years of primary education by 2005 and 8 years of schooling by 2010.	In the academic year 2005-06 national enrolment in the 6-8 grade schools was 61% and it is still lower for minorities schools. (Source Sachar Committee)
3.	Satisfactory Quality with emphasis on education for life.	Quality of education can be improved by qualitative teaching, classroom transaction, school infrastructure, supervision & monitoring, quality and unbiased textbooks in mother tongue of children which are missing for minority schools.
4.	Bridge all gender and social gaps at primary level by 2007 and elementary level by 2010.	The orthodox thinking, pardah system of society and negligence of satisfactory arrangements at school by government officials hamper achievement of this goal for girls and moreover girls of disadvantaged social group.
5.	Universal retention by 2010.	There is no surety of retention of those enrolled because of their socio-economic status, social backgrounds, psychological make ups and family requirements.

In spite of the efforts made by all the above schemes and programmes of Government of India and other state Government (mentioned above), the status of education of minorities has continued to be grim.

Issues of minority education with special reference to Urdu Schools

Sachar committee points that the Urdu language has mainly suffered due to its association with Muslim community. The role played by Urdu in freedom struggle was in vain due to partition of India by few leaders of different ideological. Now, it is high time to support this language on two grounds. Firstly, to develop the largest minority of the nation to bring them it into mainstream. Secondly, to sustain the united India’s integrated ideology. Urdu and its sister stronger Hindi has to progress together. The three language formula adopted by various states gives a scope for learning national language, local language and any of the modern Indian languages. Most of the states favoured learning of Hindi, Sanskrit and English under this scheme. Few states provides learning of their state language like Kannada, Marathi etc. along with English and Hindi. This is well received across India for a long time. But a provision should also be made for learning Urdu at primary and secondary stages of school. Attempt made by few states in these direction have resulted in teaching and learning of Urdu at schools and creation of few posts of Urdu teachers. Later on, the Urdu teaching and learning became a superficial endeavour. By learning in Urdu does not imply only learning of the language or ‘Alif’, ‘Bay’ or ‘Ghazals’. Urdu language has such a strong footing that all common school subjects can be easily taught through this medium. This language has a comprehensive glossary of terms in Science, S and Mathematics. It is worth to mention that the erstwhile while Osmania University had coined new terminologies for teaching different disciplines including engineering and medical for the post graduate programmes. A vacuum was created in Urdu teaching and learning after independence. The present day Maulana Azad National Urdu University attempts to fill this gap as parliament of India has given a mandate for this University to teach all its programmes in Urdu Medium. The programmes like B.Ed., M.B.A., ITI, Polytechnic Diplomas etc. are being taught in Urdu Medium. This gives evidence that teaching of primary and secondary schools subjects in Urdu is not a difficult task. Both the governments (all State and Central governments) have to take initiative in starting of Urdu schools. This is quite essential because the education is in concurrent list and responsibility of both the state and the centre. It is a proven fact that education of child especially primary education has to be given in mother tongue. Such researches set a premise that directs us to open Urdu schools. Few states like Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Andhra Pradesh have been imparting education in Urdu medium at primary and secondary grades. The states such as Uttar Pradesh (which has a sizeable population of Urdu speakers) and all the other states of the Hindi-Belt are yet to give necessary emphasis on Urdu medium.

The government of Delhi has opened few CBSE pattern Urdu schools it is continuously being observed that the performance of the students in these school is comparatively very low. The reason for this are varied. Few of the Urdu medium schools have been reportedly functioning under non- Urdu knowing teachers due to transfer or non-availability of Urdu teachers. The overall low achievement have been observed in different state pattern schools across the nation. This is also because of various problems being faced by these schools.

1. The Muslim or Urdu speaking communities are generally densely populated, located at slum areas or market place. Government has to provide schools in an area within one kilometre from the locality. The schools which are located in such place do not have sufficient space. These are rented or constructed improperly. The school lack space for playing for children. These classrooms lack ventilation and lighting facilities. These don’t have proper drinking facilities and separate arrangements for girls such as toilet. The school are not free from environmental pollution.

2. The advent of new schemes have brought in new logical and scientific curriculum. The books are prepared well in advance in the state’s official languages. The books so prepared are then translated into Urdu and reach the schools very late. Moreover the translators are not involved in curriculum framing. Thus, resulting in verbatim translation. By the time translation is made the philosophy of curriculum framing is lost and the objectives are distorted. This is also reflected in classroom transaction and evaluation strategies.

3. Teaching learning materials are also not available for the Urdu schools. The resource books for Urdu teachers are either not prepared or prepared after such a long duration that they lose its importance. The charts, models, computers aided material, Audio (Radio), Video (Television) programmes are not available in Urdu medium. This affects teaching learning of subjects such as Science, Social and Mathematics. Even at primary grades charts such as names of birds, animals, parts of body, numbers, pets, transports, national leaders, maps are not available in Urdu language. This hampers learning in Urdu.

4. Evaluation process and pattern has been changed time and again, the oral, written evaluation have given way to performance / competency evaluation. The child is evaluated in both curricular and co-curricular aspects. Gaining of competencies has become important than oral rote learning. The teachers are being evaluated and discussed in parent teacher meeting in school monitoring committees every month. The Urdu teachers have to adopt themselves to these new developing areas.

5. Children are being enrolled by teacher to maintain a certain Pupil Teacher Ratio. If, the enrolled learner drops from the system, then neither the teacher are bothered nor the society. Educational officers also pay less attention towards such Urdu medium schools and students. Retention of enrolled students is also more important and government officials need to develop proper schemes like mid day meals, clothes text books.

6. It is pleasing to note that the local community is involved in schools by way of formation of School Development and Monitoring Committees (SDMCs). The parents who are more politically strong become the office bearers resulting in politicisation of education. The teacher and headmasters are being affected due to will and wish of such members. The brighter aspects of such SDMCs involvement is that it has improved the status of school and “Our School” has become the motto. The school is being protected and nurtured by the society. The school has become hub of all social activities.

7. The in-service teachers in all the states were being trained in short term programme by the states in DPEP/SSA programmes. In few states like Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh the language has become a hurdle in learning. Therefore, the training programmes must be structured in Urdu. A network of trainers must be developed from cluster to state level. The grossroot, continuous and regular training of the teachers by Urdu Cluster Resource Person (CRPs) have to be increased. The Urdu Block Resource Centres (BRCs) having adequate number of resource persons are to be set up. At the district level the District Institutes of Education and Training (DIETs) have to be established for Urdu trainings. All these will help the state to target the deprived group of Urdu Community.

8. The graduates or undergraduates are transformed into teachers through teacher education programme. Presently, the teachers are trained at general teacher training institutes either in English or concerned state language. Such teachers lack practical experience of their educators and Urdu school the teaching practice. Hence, Urdu teachers training institutes are needed at pre-primary, primary, secondary levels. It is observed that none of the State Government have Urdu teachers training programmes except Andhra Pradesh, which offers Urdu Pandit Programmes. The private efforts by minorities of teacher training programmes have resulted in openings of few colleges manage by Muslims. Based on their personal compulsions, profit motto, these institutes prefer working in English or concerned state’s official languages rather than Urdu. Maulana Azad National Urdu University (MANUU), has become a ray of hope in pre-service and in-service training of teachers through Urdu Medium. This institute produces 454 B.Ed. trainees and 75 D.Ed. trainees in its pre service teacher education programmes. The same institute upgrades also 700 in service teachers by graduating them in distance mode B.Ed. programme. However, this number of Urdu teachers is quite insufficient when looked from national perspective. Therefore, it is quite essential that the State and National Governments may start such programmes under their jurisdiction.

9. The girls are considered to be soft gender in India and it is more truer in case of Urdu speaking Indian Muslims. Purdah system still prevails and parents do not want girls to be educated under co education schools especially by male teachers. Therefore, separate girls’ schools are to be opened. The Government's effort of opening Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalayas under XIth plan have to be strengthened. Further, more number of such schools are to be increased in minority dominated districts.

10. Poor achievement of students in schools and colleges, lack of representation of Urdu community in engineering, medicine administrative services is result of poor schooling. The government has opened Novodaya Vidyalayas for rural area students. On these lines the government may also start network of Residential Urdu schools across various states and nation. The government of Andhra Pradesh has few such residential schools and this number has to be increased.

11. The Urdu speaking community especially Muslims gives lot of emphasis on religious education. Even those children who dropout or do not attend schools go for Madarsa education either in fulltime or part time mode. The government policies may tap this point and open alternative schooling at these centres to bridge the gap and bring back the students to school.

12. The present era has enormous potential for use of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs). The educationists must try to reach Urdu Community through appropriate mode of ICT. Radio, Television, Newspaper, Internet have great opportunities. Such technologies take the expertise to gross root level and few experts can fill the gap at the schools. One among the authors has made extensive use of radio, teleconferencing in Urdu Primary Schools of Karnataka and found it to be more effective. These programmes were effective in state language Kannada effective too.

13. The Politicians have to serve the community who have elected them and uplift their social status. This is why most of them talk of Urdu and open Urdu schools. This has become a customary affair. The government officials follow these orders in letter and spirit, but forget the philosophy of opening of such schools. They do not bother to monitor and supervise the educational attainment of such schools. It is a surprise to note that still single teacher schools are present in Urdu Medium Government Schools. Sometimes such single teacher schools have only a language teacher. This affects learning of subjects like Environmental Science, Mathematics etc. In a state like Karnataka, if a Kannada language teacher is managing the Urdu medium single teacher school (in absence or leave of Urdu teacher) then, the entire learning system of Urdu medium falls down. The Urdu teachers have to be monitored for syllabus completion, regularity, participation in curricular and co-curricular activities at school.

14. A great deal of research has to be undertaken to understand Urdu schools at various stages of functioning. The researches at planning, implementation and evaluation stages are few of the areas. The research should be focussed on classroom and outside activities, academic and non-academic functions etc. Government must encourage all such researches.

Conclusion

The Muslim Community is an integral part of this nation. It has its own assets and liabilities. The nation can not overlook their contribution or forfeit their assets. Due to political and domestic reasons this community has suffered a lot at political, economic, religious and educational fronts. The authors have examined educational status of this community in the present paper. The Urdu language has been mainly associated with this community. The backwardness of this community has also affected learning and teaching of this language as a medium. India has made useful provision through its constitution and at the same time the political will for upliftment of this community is quite evident. Despite of all these efforts it has been seen that the community suffers on various front in education. It is the vision and leadership of the community itself which can bring suitable changes in the society. The authors are of the strong opinion that the educationist working in the areas of linguistic and religious minorities should do extensive research for developing new strategies. The three branches of government viz., Executive, Judiciary and Legislature must perform their roles for the cause of all section of the society. All this will help India in its progress towards developed country.

References:

1. http://ncm.nic.in/points_programme.html dated November 2009

2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarva_Shiksha_Abhiyan dated November 2009

3. http://www.vedamsbooks.com/no50823.htm November 2009

4. Government of India (2006), (Sachar Committee), Social, Economic and Educational status of the Muslim community of India, New Delhi

5. Government of India, Census of India