Lakshadweep Students Face Bureaucratic Battle Over Curriculum, Claim No Discussion With Stakeholders
Salahuddin | 28 December 2023 | The Wire
Boats anchored on the lagoon waters of Kavaratti Island. Photo: Sankara Subramanian/Flickr CC BY 2.0
The word ‘education’ itself is not inherently colonial, but there are many instances in history where education has been imposed on a population with complete disregard for indigenous sensitivities. Lakshadweep is one of the most literate Union Territories, ranking only after Kerala in terms of literacy rate in the country. Lakshadweep Administration’s recent decision to discontinue the Kerala syllabus in both English and Malayalam, and to migrate all students to the Central Board of Secondary Education pattern, has reopened the age-old debate on an indigenous curriculum in Lakshadweep.
From a literacy rate of 18.33% in 1951 to 70.04% in 2011, India has made significant progress on this front. However, this mission of educating the masses has failed to address cultural and geographical sensitivities across the country, including Andaman and Nicobar, Lakshadweep, and tribal areas in Kerala. They all received education with the same mainland curriculum. In Lakshadweep, education currently means adopting a syllabus borrowed from Kerala, with no separate curriculum for Lakshadweep students.