Education and Development Linkages in South Asia (I)

By V Santhakumar

Part I: Introduction

Education and economic development are part of an equilibrium, and it is obvious that education contributes to economic development. It is also true that economic underdevelopment may work against education as poverty and deprivation may deter parents from using education for their children. The poor may not have the voice to force governments to improve the access to and quality of education. How mobilised the poor and marginalised groups are and how governments respond to their needs (which are important indicators of political advancement and governance) have a bearing on the education of the majority in a country.

It is not only the political and economic factors that influence education. Social factors play an equally important role. Social fragmentation in the form of caste or race can work against the schooling of specific social groups. It may have an influence on both the demand for, and the supply of, education. Certain social groups, due to their historical deprivation, may not have adequate aspirations and that can discourage them from using education. Social fragmentation can also sustain different kinds of discrimination in the process of education including learning in classrooms. The conditions which mediate the education of girls are part of social features, which in turn can be shaped by religious and other beliefs. All these determine the education and development interlinkage in a specific social context.

This series of eight (8) articles looks at education-development interlinkages in different South-Asian countries (Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan).

South Asia: Some defining features

British colonialism played an important role in shaping the national boundaries of the region. There were two kinds of influences: First, the formation of larger territories which were until then controlled by smaller kingdoms. The second one was the division of the Indian peninsula into two countries (India and Pakistan) at the time when the colonial rulers were leaving the region. Bangladesh was created in 1971 as a result of the division of India and Pakistan. Colonialism also played an important role in the education of this region. This is discussed in detail in the following parts.

South Asia is home to one-fourth of the world population. This is partly due to the fact that India – the second most populous country in the world – is located within the region. However, Bangladesh and Pakistan are also populous adding about 380 million to the population of the region. Pakistan also has one of the highest birth rates (22 per 1000) in the world.

Demographic conditions are also related to education development. Since the education of girls is the most effective way to reduce the rate of population growth, failure in this reflects in the slower pace of the demographic transition in the region. This also results in a higher share of young people in the population in South Asia compared to other regions. Whether this is an advantage to the economy or not depends on the educational achievements of these people.

Economic and human development in South Asia

Though poverty as a percentage could be higher in Sub-Saharan Africa, the largest number of poor people live in South Asia. This could be due to the persistence of poverty in India.¹ There is some variation in the poverty levels within the region. India, Pakistan and Nepal have higher levels of poverty whereas it is relatively low in Bhutan, Maldives and Sri Lanka. Though Bangladesh was known for a higher level of poverty in the past, there is a notable improvement lately.

In terms of economic development, the region is not very successful (say, when compared with East Asia or South-East Asia). South Asia may be relatively better than Sub-Saharan Africa. Though India, Bhutan and Sri Lanka are lower-middle-income economies,² there are zones of underdevelopment even in these countries. The human development indicators of a number of countries – Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal – are lower and only marginally different from each other but Sri Lanka is a notable exception with a relatively higher level of human development.³ (Parts of India, like Kerala, may have a similar level of human development as in Sri Lanka).

Industrial development has taken place at a slower pace in the region. The majority of the people, until recently, depended on agricultural or related livelihoods and this dependence on agriculture continues to be high. The limited economic transition that occurred in major parts of the region has been the development of a service sector without much growth in the manufacturing/industrial sector. There are a few industrial activities, like pharmaceuticals where India has performed well. Bangladesh has witnessed notable development of the garment industry. The South Asian region is not known for any major manufacturing products or companies, barring pharmaceuticals, scooters, three-wheelers, etc. The slow pace of industrial development could be connected to the education development in the region.  This is discussed in detail in the following parts.

Migration and remittances from migrants continue to be an important source of income for people in the region. Among the top ten recipient countries, four are within South Asia with India being number one.⁴ The population size, poverty and slow pace of industrial development in the region and the relative scarcity of workers in the West Asian countries after the oil boom in the 1970s, might have triggered this migration of relatively less-skilled workers from the former. Almost all countries in the region benefit from this migration.

All countries have, by and large, open economies currently. Restrictions on imports and exports which were prevalent earlier disappeared in the 1980s. However, the openness of these economies did not result in notable industrial development as in the case of East- and South-East Asian economies. There could be different reasons, such as ineffective governance (or the absence of governments that could facilitate industrialisation). This can also be partly due to the failure in investing in education. One can say that the educational achievements in the South Asian region are somewhere in between those in East- and South-East Asia (E-SEA) on the one hand, and Sub-Sharan Africa (SSA) on the other hand, and the economic outcomes of the region are also somewhere in the middle of those of E-SEA and SSA.

Bhutan and Nepal face challenges in terms of diversifying their economies due to their mountainous topography and land-locked nature. These countries depend on India to some extent. Though Sri Lanka could achieve a higher level of economic development and per-capita incomes, the civil war and the governmental attention on it did not enable the country to realise its potential fully.

Some social features of South Asia

South Asia is known for a few prominent social features. There is a higher level of social fragmentation in the region. India is known for its caste system, and the majority of the poor people are from the so-called lower castes. These groups face challenges in terms of access to and use of education. Though there is an improvement in the provision of schooling to these groups, there are issues related to the lack of adequate demand leading to the dropping-out of children from secondary grades (Santhakumar et al, 2016). One-tenth of the population in India are tribals and they face a higher level of poverty and vulnerability. They were traditionally dependent on forests for their livelihood and are the least integrated into the mainstream society, which poses special challenges for their education and development. There is a certain divide between the majority Hindus and the Muslim minority in India, and the emergence of majoritarian Hindu politics has aggravated the situation. Religious minorities face difficulties in Pakistan and Bangladesh too.

Sri Lanka faced issues of ethnic divide and conflict between the majority Sinhala people and the Tamils. The latter who live in the northern part of the country, face challenges due to the disruption and destruction during the long-drawn civil war. Bhutan and Nepal have their own minor social divisions or fragmentations.⁵ Their mountainous terrain creates additional problems for development and education in these two countries.

A major social issue in the region is the persistence of discriminatory gender norms. This can take the extreme form of sex selection at birth, which is the reason for the sex ratio being unfavourable to females, especially in India and Pakistan.⁶ The gender norms have led to a lack of interest in educating girls among sections of the population or the reduced willingness to spend money to provide quality education to them. The persistence of the dowry system and patrilocal residence seem to have reduced the incentive of parents to educate girls in India.⁷ Another manifestation is the lower participation of females in paid work. Only less than 25 percent of adult females take up paid employment in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan,⁸ and this has implications for women empowerment and family welfare. Bangladesh, Bhutan and Sri Lanka are relatively better in this regard, and this reflects in certain human development indicators of these countries.

Impact of religion and beliefs on education

South Asia has almost all religions of the world. The only nations in the world with a majority of Hindus (India and Nepal) are in the region. Bangladesh and Pakistan are Muslim majority countries, but it is interesting to note that India has more people following the Islamic faith than Bangladesh. Buddhism is dominant in Sri Lanka and Bhutan. Christianity is not an insignificant minority, especially in India and Sri Lanka. There are also other faiths like Jainism and Zoroastrianism in the region.

Certain differences between religions that have implications for the spread of education may have to be noted. There is no single text (like the Bible) in so-called Hinduism. Moreover, the majority of its followers are not expected to read religious texts. The reading and interpretation of these texts were the privileges of the priestly class (Brahmans). This led to the historical deprivation of education to the lower-caste Hindus who also constituted the majority (Crook, 1996). (This has implications on the educational transformation in the contemporary period, and I discuss this later in the essay.) Such deprivation of learning opportunities did not exist in other religions, like Islam, Buddhism and Christianity, in which there was an encouragement to read the holy texts, and which helped the spread of literacy among the followers of these religions. Girls faced a higher level of discrimination in terms of education in Islam and also in other religions.

All religions nurtured schools or educational spaces to communicate their teachings. These spaces later became part of or got integrated into the formal education system. Since the Christian missionaries helped the propagation of modern education in the region, there was no major conflict of this project with their religious education. Schools that propagated Buddhism continued as in the case of Bhutan or Sri Lanka, but both these countries could also expand modern education to cover most of their population. However, there seems to be a persisting conflict in terms of the spread of religious versus modern education in the Muslim dominant countries.  This is discussed in detail in the following parts.

Politics of South Asia

A notable feature of politics in South Asia is that almost all countries are democratic despite periods of military/autocratic rules in some countries in the past. Though Nepal and Bhutan were monarchies in the past, these have also transitioned towards democracy. Despite the military regimes in the past, democracy seems to have stabilised in Pakistan and Bangladesh too. In terms of democracy, probably the South Asian region could be ahead of not only sub-Saharan Africa but also other regions.

However, these democracies face internal threats. There are separatist movements in India (like in Kashmir). Political tensions between the Sinhala and Tamil populations have declined only recently in Sri Lanka. Religious extremism poses threats in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh, and also India, to some extent. Signals of unstable democracy continue to emanate from Nepal. Bhutan is the youngest democracy within the region. The limited experiments in democracy in Afghanistan are under threat, currently. There is a continuation of elite-capture of governance in certain parts of the region.

Another feature of the politics of the region is the role of religion, caste and ethnicity in political mobilisations. These identities form the basis of the mobilisation of non-elites wherever these have happened. Hinduism and Islam are the driving forces of a set of political parties in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Sinhala and Tamil ethnic issues influence the politics in Sri Lanka. Mobilisations based on economic class are relatively limited.

Though poverty and economic vulnerability continue to be higher in South Asia, people as a whole seem active in elections and democratic processes. However, the presence of poverty and the absence of a sizeable middle-class in Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Nepal and Bangladesh pose challenges to a sustainable improvement in governance through the democratic process.⁹ There is also a high level of corruption in the governments of the region. Barring Bhutan, all other countries are noted for high levels of corruption.¹⁰

Politics plays an important role in the development of education in a region. South Asia is not known for a top-down approach for providing schooling to all (as in the case of socialist countries, like the USSR or China or even capitalist countries, like South Korea or Indonesia). Education policies in South Asia were determined mostly through the democratic choices of the majority. Hence, when the governments were not working towards the universalisation of education, it was more due to the lack of demand for education by the majority (and their socio-economic conditions may have shaped this demand). This is discussed in detail in the following parts.

Initial phase of modern education in the region

Since India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were together as a country, which along with Sri Lanka were under British rule, colonial administration played an important role in the spread of modern education in the region. The education initiated by the colonial rulers had a limited purpose – to create manpower that would comprise the middle or lower levels of their administrative machinery.¹¹ Providing `schooling to all was not their intention.¹²

However, the situation in India continued like this even after its independence (say, until the 1990s). The post-independence governments were liberal (and democratic), and hence, they valued modern education. But their liberal attitude did not persuade them to use a mandatory schooling policy, and the approach was to provide education to those who demanded it.¹³ This reduced the demand for school education, but there was a demand for the expansion of higher education among those minority of people (including the upper caste groups) who were completing school education. This prompted the post-independent governments in India to focus on the provision of higher education.¹⁴ The expansion of school education started effectively after the mid-1980s.¹⁵

The situation in Nepal and Bhutan which were not directly affected by colonialism was a little different. Hinduism was dominant in Nepal. Though Buddhism was being practised, it was pushed towards the northern region because of the ascendence of powerful forces practicing Hinduism. Hence, the early educational efforts of these rulers were aimed at the needs of elites (upper castes).¹⁶ Though schools were opened to lower castes in the middle of the twentieth century, there were no major efforts to encourage all sections to use schooling. Hence, the situation in Nepal is closer to that in India. Bhutan’s traditional education was carried out in monasteries (Hirayama, undated). The absence of casteism might have worked against the exclusion of specific social groups from this traditional education. However, the coverage of this education was limited due to the limited resources and the mountainous topography. The real expansion of school education started only after the 1970s (with the support of teachers who came from India).

Sri Lanka attempted consciously to provide school education to all even during the colonial period (Little, 2010). It also included schooling in the mother tongue. This could be due to the political mobilisation of non-elites even during that period. These early efforts were reflected in the human development indicators of Sri Lanka. Pakistan and Bangladesh had a trajectory somewhat similar to India but there are minor differences too. Since Pakistan (which included Bangladesh initially) became a Muslim-majority nation as part of the division of colonial India, religion started playing an important role in education there (UNESCO, 1993).

Education in South Asia: A comparative picture

In order to have a comparative picture of the education situation of different countries in South Asia, we take a single statistic – enrolment in secondary schools. The latest available data is summarised in the following table.¹⁷

Table: Secondary School Enrolment (% Gross) in South Asia

One can classify these countries into four groups: (a) Sri Lanka and Bhutan; (b) India and Nepal, (c) Bangladesh and Maldives; and (d) Pakistan and Afghanistan. The first group is very successful in ensuring access to even secondary education to almost all children. There are improvements but lingering underachievement in the second and third groups, but we classify them separately for other reasons (discussed later). Pakistan and Afghanistan are notable for their failure to improve their education situation.

Barring Sri Lanka and Bhutan, other countries in South Asia have not been very successful in extending school education to all through pro-active governmental efforts which are needed to overcome the constraining family circumstances of children that prevent them from using school. This would mean that family and social conditions continue to play an important role in the educational achievements of children in the region. If parents feel that education is not important to their children, it may work against the children’s completion of schooling. However, this `demand’ for education may change over time. An improvement in economic opportunities for educated people may encourage some parents (not all) to use education. These economic changes could be related to globalisation and economic integration. The differences in the way people or social groups respond to economic changes could be based on their social and other contextual factors. These factors may be playing out somewhat differently in different countries. We discuss these trends in each country of the region in detail in the following parts.

AUTHOR
V Santhakumar, Professor, Azim Premji University, Bangalore

This is Part 1 of 6 parts that will be published over the coming weeks.
Read Part II
Read Part III
Read Part IV
Read Part V
Read Part VI

Featured photo by Bradford Zak on Unsplash