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One of the most speedy and substantial social shifts in human history has been the evolution of gender relations since the turn of the 20th century. Even though female health, literacy and women participation in workforce have significantly improved, the status of women in Indian society is not very satisfactory leading to gender disparities. It is in this background that this paper attempts to analyse the role of education, labour market and health in reducing gender disparities across the states over the period of time. To analyse the impact of these variables, Gender Disparity Index (GDI) has been constructed utilising the data from Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) and Sample Registration System (SRS) to measure gender disparities in 20 major states and union territories (UTs) of India. For the construction of GDI, we have used three dimensions, namely health, empowerment and labour market participation. The index is prepared to make a decadal comparative study for the years 2011–12 and 2020–21. The statistical results indicate that there is a significant difference in mean of the GDI scores for 2020–21 and 2011–12. The paper concludes with certain policy implications suggesting that there is a need to put more effort into creating infrastructure and cutting-edge policies to improve the health and education systems. The focus should also be to create more employment opportunities for females, helping them to raise their standard of living so as to enhance their contribution towards economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Caste is an important and unique axis of inequality in India. Caste based digital divide can exacerbate the existing socioeconomic divisions between different caste groups. • Using non-linear decomposition method, the present paper explains the digital divide between disadvantaged and other caste groups. • We find that there is a considerable first level and second level digital divide between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others in India. • The caste-based digital divide is largely explained by the differences in education and income between the caste groups. • The study foregrounds the importance of bridging the caste-based digital gap by closing the gap between the educational attainments of the disadvantaged and other caste groups. With the increasing importance of information and communication technologies in access to basic services like education and health, the question of digital divide based on caste assumes importance in India where large socioeconomic disparities persist between different caste groups. Studies on caste-based digital inequality are still scanty in India. Using nationally representative survey data, this paper analyzes the first-level digital divide (ownership of computer and access to the Internet) and the second-level digital divide (individuals skills to use computer and the Internet) between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others. Further, this paper identifies the caste-based differences in socioeconomic factors that contribute to the digital divide between these groups using a non-linear decomposition method. The results show that there exists large first-level and second-level digital divide between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others in India. The non-linear decomposition results indicate that caste-based digital divide in India is rooted in historical socioeconomic deprivation of disadvantaged caste groups. More than half of the caste-based digital gap is attributable to differences in educational attainment and income between the disadvantaged caste groups and Others. Findings of this study highlight the urgent need for addressing educational and income inequality between the different caste groups in India in order to bridge the digital divide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pandemic and online learning have added to barriers to education. Lack of digital access, difficulty in communication with teachers and lack of peer support create major hurdles in learning for a large proportion of the student population. New entry barriers to better jobs, level and quality of higher education, will add to existing social barriers of gender, caste and nepotism. This will perpetuate a vicious cycle of low education and low incomes. In this paper, we investigate whether there is a threshold of level of education for better jobs in India? We find that higher secondary education is a threshold required for entry into good jobs. We observe increasing returns to private investments in higher levels of education and higher returns to education in the formal sector jobs compared to the informal sector. Will deficits in education during the pandemic reduce investments in education? We study these issues mainly using secondary data from the National Sample Office (NSO). The purpose of this short paper is to build research hypotheses regarding the relation between investment in education and employment, which we highlight in the conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fundamental Rights and Directive Principles of State Policy, enshrined in Part III & IV of the Indian Constitution reflect that India is a welfare state. These rights ensure that the government safeguards the economic and social well-being of its citizens. Keeping in mind the responsibility of the state in ensuring these rights, the G.O.I. has been launching different welfare programmes from time to time under four major welfare categories, namely, wage employment, education, health and food security and nutrition as per the demand of the hour. However, the success of the schemes can be achieved only with proper governance. Nevertheless, indicators of governance do not pretense healthy trends. Given the highly uneven performance demonstrated by the states in terms of improvement with regard to the above-mentioned social dimensions, four case studies have been showcased in this paper from West Bengal, a state falling in the category of Medium Social Progress State during the year of 2021-22. The paper attempts to capture the quality of governance of social welfare programmes pre pandemic and during the pandemic when the importance of such social welfare schemes had been accentuated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to assess the intergenerational mobility of educational and employment status using a nationally representative large dataset collected by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) for the 68th round Employment and Unemployment Survey (EUS) in India. To understand the influence of mother's and father's educational status on their children's education and employment, sons' data has been matched with mother's and father's data for each household. The paper applies multinomial logistic regression analysis to predict the impact of parents' education on their sons' educational and employment status achievements. Father's education level has moderate upward mobility across generations, while mother's education level is having a significantly higher influence on the upward mobility of sons' educational and employment outcomes. Parental education determines children's' educational level and employment status after controlling other factors. Therefore, the study suggests more inclusive educational policies with more generous incentives for less educated households, to encourage their children to send to quality schools to compensate for the lower education level of parents. It is also crucial to emphasize and pay greater attention towards improving female education as mother's education has more intergenerational positive impact on children's education and employment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teaching English in India successfully is still a burning issue. After learning English for more than ten years or so, the under graduating populace cannot communicate in English either in the classroom or in real-life contexts. Therefore, students' proficiency in English has been the constant thought of teachers, teacher trainers, ELT experts, and linguists over all these years. We, as teachers, are always conscious of how we can make our students learn English, how they would become fluent in English. We do some experiments with pedagogical devices in the classroom. This paper is an attempt to find out how do role plays help in developing speaking skills. This paper is also an attempt to find out whether role plays help in developing students' communicative competence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is an attempt to understand the occupational segregation among socio-religious groups in India. Using Employment and Unemployment Survey 2011–2012, the paper builds index of dissimilarity and Hutchens square root index to measure the segregation. The paper has found that segregation in general is higher in urban areas than in rural areas and among females than males. The highest segregation is, however, recorded between Hindu STs/SCs and Muslim OBC in urban areas, followed by Hindu others and Muslim others. The value of segregation index is the least in the case of Muslim OBC and Muslim others, confirming the almost similar pattern of occupations between them. Regular employment seems to emerge as driver of occupational segregation for males, while both regular employment and self-employment drive segregation among females. On the other hand, rising education levels raise segregation among males of all socio-religious groups. We also found that Muslim-populous states have low segregation, while Muslim-sparse states have high segregation between Hindu and Muslim. The occupations in which Muslims and Hindu STs/SCs are concentrated, have poor indicators of work decency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper delves into the origins for Linguistic Inequality in India which persists despite various efforts to support multilingualism especially in the context of education. It enquires into the socio-political and theoretical basis for the present situation of language use in educational context. It begins by examining some theories of linguistic analysis with their strengths and shortcomings, and then demonstrates how some of these can assist in understanding the complex linguistic situation and resulting marginalization of languages and associated communities in a multilingual set up such as India. A generalized theory of language synthesizing different perspectives is elusive till now, but appropriating the structure of power hierarchies, derived from the usage of language in social context by sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, I've tried to make sense of the issue dominant languages in a multilingual set up and how these interact with the socio-political discourse of power. Analysing the linguistic situation from this socio-linguistic theoretical framework and touching upon the interaction of education and other 'significant domains' through brief outlines from the constituent assembly debates, the constitution itself and subsequent educational policies and their implementation, I've attempted to arrive at a basis for the inequality that we witness today in Indian education in terms of language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores equity challenges common to short-term cross-cultural research partnerships. We focus on a project-based activity in which U.S. undergraduate students and college faculty taught middle-school students in Goa, India how to make podcasts about complex environmental problems. Project team members conducted a collaborative auto-ethnography focused on questions of power, leadership, collaboration, and equity, and examined exit- interview photo elicitation data to identify the core challenges of ethical and equitable short-term cross-cultural research and programming. Our use of photographs as conversation prompts helped to highlight contradictions and asymmetries along axes of power, cultural imperialism, knower-knowledge, age, race/ethnicity, social class, and gender. We reflect on possibilities for educational research that rejects a "voluntourism" model and moves, if imperfectly, toward more equitable international collaborations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human development is considered to be the ultimate objective of development, with economic growth as a means to achieve it (Ranis et al. in World Dev 28(2):197–219, 2001). Development stands to be justified when it is equipped with good employment opportunities. Employment provides the means for meeting the income and subsistence needs of the individuals and their families, which fulfils the goal of overall and equitable development (Mathew in Int Labour Rev 154:497–518, 2015). Employment levels would rise when there is sufficient and efficient human capital. Human capital establishes an interconnection between employment and development. The relationship between education and employment is better understood through the labour market, which has a mediating role in influencing educational choices and employment prospects. Against this background, this paper tries to examine the interlinkages between human development, economic growth and employment situation in India with special reference to females in Kerala. Using secondary data, this paper tries to address primarily two objectives: firstly, to examine the relationship between educational attainment, employment and economic growth in India and secondly, to explore the trends and pattern in female employment state-wise with the main focus on Kerala. There exists a huge mismatch between the demand and supply gap among labour force in all Indian states. Employment trends in India, and in particular, women's employment, have been an issue of considerable discussion in scholarly writings over the last few years. Extensive literature review and data suggest that though there has been a constant rise in the educational level of women in India, the employment rates have not raised at a similar pace. Kerala, the most literate state of the country, shows an identical picture among higher educated women where unemployment rate is as high as 20–30%. Women's individual job preferences, overall high unemployment in the economy, family constraints, lack of adequate skills and discouraged worker effect are some of the probable reasons for high unemployment among females. The study concludes that "Kerala model of development," on the basis of its impressive historical accomplishment in social and human development indicators, is definitely praiseworthy but not to be replicated. It is so because though the model has surpassed every state in terms of human development indicators, it showed a development trajectory by fostering unemployment rates, especially in terms of female participation. Therefore, the study suggests that in order to achieve holistic development, there is an urgent need to understand the basic requirement of a particular state. Considering female employment, the study evokes creation of an environment that promotes women to join workforce and thereby attain economic growth. States such as Kerala which have a large pool of educated women must develop policies which aim towards enhancing their employability skills so that the benefits of human capital can be obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Successful understudies are understudies who perform much preferable scholastically over their companions. While advantages to are being a successful understudy, for example, getting additional help from instructors, they likewise experience interesting difficulties like expanded recurrence of harassing. A large part of the exploration on this gathering of understudies depends on quantitative investigations led on members of Caucasian plummet. It is proposed that getting a superior comprehension of these successful understudies could be accomplished by figuring out their encounters through a subjective methodology. A singular's encounters and discernments can be impacted by social factors and directing examination with an Asian populace would assist better with understanding how factors which are all the more unequivocally accentuated in Asian culture, for example, obedient devotion and acquiescence to guardians add to the encounters of Asian successful understudies Education is viewed as basic for the advancement of the people, yet additionally for the improvement of local area and country. To achieve upgrades in all perspectives, and use present day and creative procedures and techniques, people need to produce mindfulness and improve their instructive abilities. The primary reason for this examination paper is to figure out the elements that impact the scholarly presentation of the understudies in auxiliary schools in India. In optional schools, there are various variables inside school and outside school that impact the scholastic presentation of the understudies. The fundamental regions that have been considered incorporate, factors impacting the scholarly exhibition of the understudies, scholastic execution and huge number of understudies in class, parental and related factors connecting with scholastic accomplishment, commitment of school factors towards the scholastic presentation of understudies, impact of destitution on scholastic accomplishment of understudies and different reasons for low scholarly accomplishment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large classes, i.e. classrooms with a large number of students, are becoming the norm at all levels of education. These classes have often been associated with a variety of problems, and this paper aims to examines the impact of large classrooms on higher education in India. The main purpose of this paper is to understand the current system of education, and suggest measures, if necessary, to maximise students' learning in large classes. A survey was conducted, and questions were posed to teachers and students to understand their thoughts and perceptions regarding large classrooms and to identify gaps which could be filled. While smaller classrooms may be beneficial to aspects like attitude towards learning, active participation, and immediate feedback, with some modification, these could be ensured in larger classes as well. These suggestions would help in enabling students to learn better and harness their skills to the maximum potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Education has contradictory implications for young women in north India. • The nature of these contradictions has changed as new forms of patriarchy emerge. • Marriage constrains women's capacity to navigate education. • Long-term research reveals contradictions at a cohort and a household scale. • The Indian Government should invest in improving tertiary education for women. Scholars are increasingly emphasizing the contradictory nature of schooling's social effects, often blending Sen's (2000) insights on education's empowering role with critical sociological work on schooling and inequality (e.g. Majumdar and Mooij, 2011; Morarji, 2014). This paper advances this literature through examining shifts in girls' education in Bemni, Uttarakhand, India. The paper draws on two periods of ethnographic research – in 2003–2004 and between 2012 and 2017 – as a means of tracking long-term changes in the nature of the contradictions that young women experience. In the 1990s and early 2000s there was a marked increase in girls' primary schooling in this village and Uttarakhand more broadly. But girls were largely excluded from secondary school, and patriarchal assumptions regarding women's work remained largely unchallenged. By 2012, however, young women were participating in secondary education, seeking paid employment, and felt empowered by their schooling. Nevertheless, key challenges remained. Educated women experienced underemployment, relegation into less favoured university courses, and difficulties navigating marriage markets. In making these points, the paper underlines the value of holding the theoretical ideas of Sen (2000) alongside critical approaches to education, but it goes beyond existing work on the contradictions of education in two key ways. First, it highlights the experiences and voices of young women in the rural Global South, about whom there is currently a dearth of substantive material. I show that the contradictions associated with education among young women are sometimes different to those experienced by men in similar settings (e.g. Jeffrey et al., 2008; Mains, 2012). Second, I argue that the contradictions associated with education can change over time within a single location – an observation that emerges from longitudinal ethnographic research of the type showcased here. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Caste for a long time has determined the educational attainment of an individual belonging to specific castes. But even today, people belonging to lower castes are discriminated against and are not given equal opportunities to attain education. Women and people belonging to the lower caste have been historically denied the access to education and even after 60 years of independence and abolishment of untouchability, the lower caste such as Scheduled Castes, OBCs and Scheduled Tribes lag far behind the Brahmins and other forward castes in educational attainment. This paper shows the disparity that exists in the attainment of education (primary, secondary or higher education) among different castes. Using the India Human Development Survey-II (IHDS-II), 2011-12, the paper tries to show the unequal level of educational attainment of households belonging to different castes. The paper brings out the state-wise analysis of disparity that exists in access to education by different castes and also shows the disparity that exists in access to education between men and women of the same caste. It is evident from the analysis of the IHDS-II (2011-12) dataset that, even after so many years of implementation of reservation policies for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in the field of education, disparity still exists among different Castes with a significant gap between them. It is quite clear that the caste hierarchy and stratification is embedded in the Indian society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Present work aims at exploring the legislative and institutional infrastructure for ensuring the prompt assurance of the right to education on both sides of the border. In India, the right to education has been brought from the directives of policy-Article 45- to the inventory of fundamental rights-Article 21A and in Pakistan; the insertion of Article 25A has given the right to education new dimensions. So, the paper dogmatically analyses the issue as to what extent, extant arrangement are in league with provisions contained in the constitutions, conventions and declarations adopted by both of the countries [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

English is one of the largest spoken languages in the world. It is also widely spoken in India with the influence of different 'variety' of Indian languages which ultimately results a variety known as 'Indian English'. Indian English is serried phrase that refers to variety (various forms) of English used in different states of India. The term 'variety' is used to refer to any variant of a language which can be sufficiently delimited from another variant. In general term it is any distinctive form of language or linguistic expression. Linguists commonly use language variety (or simply variety) as a cover term for any of the overlapping subcategories of a language including dialect, idiolect, register and social dialect. In this paper we will discuss one of the varieties of Indian English which is called as 'Kashmiri English'. This paper will highlight the conditions and main functions of English in Kashmir. It will focus on the sub-varieties of Kashmiri English. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Veterinary education provides human resource required for augmenting public good. In a country, where up to 80% population is rural and animal husbandry is the livelihood, veterinary profession provides the desired professional coverage. The available 46 colleges are inadequate to turn out the required number of vets. Out of these, only six conform to the standards laid down by the Veterinary Council of India. One lacuna that remains, common to all, is 'shortage of teachers'. This paper attempts to address this problem. A veterinary college requires constant, continuous and caring support of government. Compliance of the VCI/ICAR accreditation inspection reports lies with the government. A synchronous functional operation of Government and veterinary colleges provides uninterrupted supply of human resource to carry out the state development programmes. Technical advisory support is provided by the VCI/ICAR. ICAR extends support through funding some research projects and also investment in building infrastructure in the form of development grants. VPHE discipline occupies a central position in veterinary teaching. On one side, it is connected with the wellness of animals - 'prevention and control of animal diseases' and on the other side it takes care of the health of humans - professionally exposed to zoonotic infections. Farmers, animal product's processors, lab workers, epidemiologists, health workers, sylvan, camping and recreational groups constitute a large chunk of population that is served by VPHE professionals. They also provide a protective role to consumers from Farm to Fork. Reputation of a college depends upon the reputation of faculty and available infrastructure. Professors of VPHE and Deans of veterinary faculty are expected to be highly knowledgeable. They need to connect horizontally with public - all stakeholders and in all such areas where veterinary services are required to address the problems. Such initiatives would benefit both. The expertise/services of veterinarians, especially VPHE personnel are not sufficiently utilized for want of a Government policy adopting "One Health", although advocated jointly by OIE, WHO, FAO and adopted by most countries. This has been advocated strongly in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

India's Muslims, over 177 million, represent the world's third-largest population next only to Indonesia and Pakistan. In India, they constitute about 14.2% of total population and are the second-largest religious community in the country. But, Indian Muslims are backward socially, economically, educationally, and politically. The present paper first attempts to analyse, from the available data, the Muslim backwardness especially in education. It will also explore the issues and challenges the Muslim community is facing. Various socio-economic indicators reveal a dismal picture. Muslim shave been systematically deprived of their rights and are stuck at the lowest socio-economic stratum in relation to other minority religious communities in India. The paper, hence, suggests various community initiatives through economic betterment and educational advancement--religious and modem--critical thinking, proper awareness and positive engagement and management as the key remedial measures to alleviate their backwardness. It also advocates that if all affluent people pay their zakat; and there is then the proper utilisation of zakat and other waqf endowments this would have tremendous potential towards betterment of downtrodden Muslims. Owing to their significant numbers, the well-being of Indian Muslims place great implications for the overall well-being of Indian society in particular and for the Muslim world in general. Therefore, the paper demands the government has to play a constructive role in addressing the grievance of the Muslim community; to implement recommendations made by various committee groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rabindranath Tagore's Vishwa Bharati, established in 1901, is a well-known innovation in the education system. What is perhaps less known is his innovation in the open and distance learning (ODL) system. A few years into his establishing Vishwa Bharati, he realized the pressing need to take education to the doorsteps of the unreached. He observed, "Universities here are like a lighted railway compartment in a train passing through the countryside which is enveloped in darkness." His goal was to empower those people, who never had the opportunity to get a formal education, with necessary knowledge and skills. In 1939, he was inspired by the ideas to establish the Lok Siksha Samsad or the Peoples' Education Council, which was the foundation of the first open ODL system in India and perhaps in the world. He ensured that the students of this 'non-formal' system received all the educational facilities necessary for their knowledge and skill development through a network of the resources available at Vishwa Bharati and Sriniketan. This paper draws upon some of the original articles of Tagore to understand his philosophy behind this innovation. The paper further attempts to elucidate the innovative aspects of Lok Siksha Samsad with reference to the parameters of innovation, such as novelty, meeting specific needs, feasibility, scalability and costeffectiveness. The findings of this paper are expected to throw light on the potential of Tagore's innovation to introduce new ideas and practices into the present ODL system for skill development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The word 'Secularism' is derivedfrom Latin word Saeculum' which means 'of this age ' 'related to this world' etc. In the Encyclopaedia Americana it is defined as an ethical system founded on the principles of natural morality and independent of revealed religion or supernaturalism. It arose and developed at a period when the relations of science and religion were beginning to be regarded as directly opposed to one another. Secularism held that its principles could be established and sustained by the intellect. It deals with the known world interpreted by experience and neither offers nor forbids any opinion regarding another world. Thus secularism and religion were defined in mutually exclusive terms. Secularism as a political principle emerged during the time of renaissance and has been very widely accepted in the twentieth century. After the political surgery of India into India and Pakistan, India adopted the concept of secularism as one of its basic principles of governance. Jawaharlal Nehru's faith in secularism gave a definite shape to the Indian polity. Western thinkers regard secularism as a complete separation between religion and politics. On the other hand, Indian thinkers have given a slightly different meaning to the concept. Keeping in mind this Indian perspective, three parameters of secularism were used to examine Nehru's political ideas. They are: tolerance ofall religions, accommodation of minorities' rights, and equal protection of allfaiths by the state. It is in this regard that it is important to understand the relevance of secularism in Indian Education system. The paper is divided into four parts. First part deals with the overview of the paper by introducing some important debates related to the basic conceptual notion of secularism .Secondpart deals with the concept o f secularism and its dimensions. Third part deals with the relevance of secularism and its importance for the working of Indian democracy. Fourth part talks about the inculcation of secular teaching in syllabi o f Indian educational system. Finally paper concludes with the overall analysis of the concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a multilingual country like India, there exists a hierarchy among languages. While major Indian languages compete with each other for the position of power, leaving the minority and tribal languages far behind, at the top of this ladder is English, which has been variously described by educationists and politicians as an 'imposition' of the colonial rule, a 'gift' or the last 'legacy' of the imperial power. In the present context of the country, there is an increasing demand for English education, evident from the growth of small scale Private English Medium schools everywhere in India. On the other hand, all policy documents related to education stress the importance of Indigenous languages as the media of Instruction at least in primary classes. What, then, justifies the continued overwhelming presence of English in our context? This Paper attempts to outline the process of rise and growth of English language in the pre-independence India till the present time. The paper would also attempt to understand the perspective of young adults with respect to English vis-à-vis their sense of social identity through a study conducted with young adults engaged in different professions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the Periodic Labour Force Survey (2017–2018), this paper explores women's labour market participation and employment patterns mediated by education and caste, with a focus on highly educated women. We find that women's workforce participation follows a clear caste pattern, with the upper castes having the lowest work participation rates and this increases as we go down the caste hierarchy. These differences narrow down among highly educated women (graduate and above), particularly in urban areas. Considering the workforce participation rate (WPR) by education, female WPR by education class follows a U-shape and this holds across castes. Caste patterns persist in work status; in the female labour force in urban areas, general-caste women are more likely to be in regular employment characterised by employment stability than the other social groups. Among regular workers, Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) women are more likely to work in the public sector—a likely result of affirmative action policies of the state. However, while the policy of reservations may have worked in favour of SC/ST communities in terms of accessing public employment, it has not translated to access to good-quality jobs as caste patterns permeate into industry and occupation. Regression results show that caste and education emerge as important variables that explain women's workforce participation, and the interaction effect of caste and education is critical in understanding women's work participation. That accessing education even at the highest levels does not level the gap between social groups in terms of WPR implying that policies aimed towards increasing female employment therefore need to be nuanced to take into account the hetegeneous nature of the women workers, even for the highly educated segment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyses the contribution o f Indian Journal o f Open learning (IJOL) from volume one to ten. In ten volumes, IJOL has published 203 articles and 75 book reviews. Authors from twenty countries (excluding India) and 17 states of India have contributed papers regularly to sustain this publication. Analysis reveals that over the years IJOL has emerged as one o f the scholarly publications in Open and Distance learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social media are web-based services that can be used all around the world and used in different purposes like education, health, business, building social relations with other people, sharing activities, ideas, career interests, images, etc. The aim of this paper is to know the effect of social media on Arab students' education and to explore the most common social media used by Arab students at Aligarh Muslim University (AMU). Both qualitative and quantitative methods were used in this study. The data were collected from 285 Arab participants who were studying in AMU by questionnaire. The date were analyzed by Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) descriptive statistics to know the mean and standard deviation of every item. The results of this study indicated that, there are two sides for the effect of social media on Arab students' education. Firstly, positive effects which include improving skills such as speaking and writing, helping in group discussions, consulting teachers online anytime and anywhere, enhancing the relationship between colleagues and teachers, etc. Secondly, negative effects like time wastage, distracting studies, wrong information, hacking, etc. Furthermore, the results for positive and negative effects of social media on Arab students indicated that positive effects have highest mean with 2.691, whereas, negative effects have the mean of 2.674. So, Arab students tend to use social media in their education positively more than negatively. The highest social media site used by Arab students is YouTube with 14.8% while the lowest social media site used by Arab students is skype with 4.7%. Briefly, social media platforms have a positively significant effect on Arab students' education performance in India tertiary institution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2015, the United Nations member states adopted the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Education, which is the fourth Sustainable Development Goal, has seen some major transformations with the advent of digital technologies. Education is now increasingly being imparted through these digital technologies as well. In the past few years, researchers have paid considerable attention to studying this changing educational landscape. However, there exists two major gaps. First, the existing literature highlights the importance of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in imparting quality education by exploring characteristics of ICTs such as: portability, connectivity and usability but fails to explore learners' perception towards online education. Second, the changing educational landscape resulting from the use of ICTs has often been reported with regard to developed economies, giving little consideration to emerging knowledge economies. The present study overcomes these two gaps by exploring the motivators; de-motivators; as well as potential facilitators of online education, from the perspective of learners in emerging knowledge economies. Further, it attempts to understand individual differences with respect to country, gender, age, employment status and educational qualification towards the enrolment, preference and awareness related to online education. The study presents an in-depth comparative analysis of two emerging knowledge economies: India and Uganda and has been undertaken in two phases. In the first phase in-depth interviews were conducted with 51 learners to explore the motivators, de-motivators, and potential facilitators of online education. Data thus collected was checked for content validity through an extensive literature review. In the second phase, a structured questionnaire was administered to 252 respondents, drawn from a population of participants pursuing or having an intention to pursue online education in both countries. The present work provides better insights for further facilitation and improvement of online education in emerging knowledge economies. Mann-Whitney U-Tests and Kruskal-Wallis tests were undertaken to establish statistical validity. The paper concludes with some suggestions and recommendations on how to overcome barriers and factors which de-motivate learners from pursuing online education in order to achieve the desired Sustainable Development Goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the current paper is to present a comparison of the three different approaches of teaching English grammar in the Indian Language classrooms. Furthermore, an attempt is also made to provide examples of the grammar presentation and practice exercises of the latest and the most effective but unfortunately the least used method of grammar teaching in Indian educational landscape i.e. Communicative English Language Teaching approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • We analyse gender disparity in drop out from schools in India. • Gender disparity has fallen over time, but still persists in rural areas. • Disparity is lower at higher levels of school. • Muslim girls fare better than girls from other social groups. Abstract In this paper, we apply survival analysis to examine gender variations in retention at different levels of school education in India. The source of data is the 68th round of the National Sample Survey on Employment and Unemployment, undertaken in 2011–12. Analysis indicates that a high proportion of enrolled students generally complete primary levels. Thereafter, there is a sharp drop-out of both boys and girls. Cohort-wise analysis of survival functions reveals that gender disparity has fallen over time, but persists markedly in rural areas. Although socially backward classes like Muslims lag behind Hindu Forward Castes, girls within the Muslim community are in a relatively better position. Recent government measures to ensure inclusive educational system seem to have had an effect on reducing both drop-outs and the gender gap. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study provides an overview about massive open online courses (MOOCs), about how technology has changed over the years the face of distance learning and how relevant and beneficial these courses might be for distance learners. Studies related to MOOCs in India and world around have been reviewed. It also furnishes the details of various MOOCs platform such as The Open University, Iversity, ALISON, Open Learning, Coursera, Udacity, EdX and EduKart available free of cost to distance learners. This paper further provides availability of MOOCs in India and various institutions and companies associated across the nation providing MOOCs courses to academia. Limitations of MOOCs and their future has also been discussed. The paper concludes that MOOCs and online education has a huge potential which would help in accelerating and ensuring social cohesion and sustainable growth. With little efforts by the government of India, online education can successfully reach every individual. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the prospect of Human Resource Development (HRD) in the libraries of Higher Education Institutions (HEI) in North East India with special reference to library automation. A group of 172 libraries of North East India was selected for the questionnaire based survey conducted during the period 2007-2010 using Likert Scaling method. The analysis of the data collected in this survey shows that there is lack of HRD practices in majority of these libraries. Results of this survey shows that the library professionals working in these libraries, need proper training in different aspects of automation like basic computer operation, maintenance, design websites, searching OPAC etc. The paper highlights the need for proper HRD in libraries involved in automation. The responses received in the survey provide ample evidence for the authorities to develop proper training programs to keep the library manpower abreast of latest technologies. The paper also unfolds the true picture of HRD in the libraries of HEIs in the remote North East corner of India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indian Writing in English (IWE) finds its roots in early British colonies in India, that is in early 18th century. And, since then many creative hands carved IWE and transported it to present stature. Undoubtedly, English easily made its way into Indian lives and became more than any other language in India. The present paper discusses the Indian Writing in English since its inception to post-colonial period in India. And it also focuses on many authors' and poets' perceptions and themes that are seasoned along with Indian history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on two aspects of classroom interaction between the instructor and the learner participants in English as a second language (L2) classroom in Assam. First, the style of questioning of the instructor that helped him to create spoken discourses between himself and the learners and among the learners themselves. Secondly, focus is on the various cultural information that the instructor brought in for discussion and the ways in which the information was integrated with the course under study. The researcher attempted to investigate the specific cultural aspects highlighted by the instructor and the manner in which the weaving of culture and language was promoted in the classroom discourse by keeping a close look at the instructor's questions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main aim of this paper is to promote Ambedkharism in the contemporary era. Thereby, investigation was done to measure the attitude of tribal students towards Hindi language. Based on the requirement of the study undertaken, a sample of 100 students were selected randomly from the Govt. Hr. Sec. Schools of Upper Siang district in Arunachal Pradesh with Normative Survey method. The Tools used were self developed tools for measuring students' attitude towards Hindi and to compare their attitudes towards Hindi and tribal languages. With the use of percentage, a highly positive attitude of tribal students towards Hindi language was measured. Besides, by using t-test, it was also measured that no significant difference was found between the attitudes of tribal students towards Hindi and tribal languages. Interestingly, the investigator had collected some points on suggestions for the promotion of Hindi language from the tribal students which included- Inclusion of Hindi as compulsory subject, Organization of workshop, conference, seminar, symposium etc. on the importance of Hindi, Hindi --as the medium of instruction, Extra Hindi classes outside the regular class schedules, Celebration of Dr. Ambedkar's Birthday, Recruitment of good and sufficient number of Hindi teachers, Regular conduction of essay competition and poem recitation in Hindi language, Giving special award to the toppers in Hindi subject and so on. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

India is a multilingual country with 780 languages written in 66 scripts (PLSI), of which 22 are scheduled languages. India's North East has about 220 languages which fall under three linguistic families. Every Indian school has a reflection of this multilingualism in terms of the numbers of languages coming into a class. The country set mother tongue based multilingual education as a goal of school education (National Curriculum Framework: NCF 2005) the stand has been re affirmed through Right to Education (RTE) Act 2009. As a response to these initiatives as well as from the recent trend of identity assertion phenomena in North East India, many tribal/minority languages are emerging in the school education curriculum. Karbi and Mising language of Assam have been introduced in the Education system in 1980s but the recent field work conducted in the two languages reveals that the people at large are not aware of the significance of bringing tribal languages in education rather it is considered as one of the initiatives of the government and there is not much people can do about sustaining these languages in education. The paper intends to look into the challenges of sustaining tribal languages in the education system in today's globalised world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper traces the historical perspectives of open and distance education in India. It also discusses the various modalities and standards followed by various universities in offering social work education through open and distance learning (ODL) mode. It also highlights the achievements and challenges of social work education through ODL mode in India. The article will be extremely helpful to the academicians and policy makers in understanding the various dimensions of social work education through ODL mode in Indian context. The study recommends that Indira Gandhi National Open University model is one of the successful models of offering social work education through ODL mode. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With rapid industrialization and technological development, India is facing adverse affects of unsustainable pattern of production and consumption. Education for sustainable development has been widely recognized to reduce the threat of environmental degradation and resource depletion. This paper used the content analysis method to explore the extent to which green curriculum has been incorporated in engineering education. The green curriculum index suggests that Indian technological education is following vertical integration, with low emphasis on horizontal integration of green curriculum resulting into non-sustained green culture and environmental behaviour among the students. Furthermore, higher educational institutions should understand and accept the relevance of sustainable development rather than responding to the legitimate formality for creating a low- carbon and green economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the results from a qualitative research study that explores the experiences of high school teachers in the field of pedagogy. The study considers teachers who may not have explicitly learned about or applied innovative practice in teaching English. It investigates how feasible and desirable they find the techniques and pedagogical approaches to be based on their teaching experiences in school with largely upper -middle class students, so the issue of applying pedagogical approaches with affluent students adds a dimension of interest to this study. It was generally expected that school teachers would be implementing several teaching approaches prescribed in NCF-2005 but these pedagogies were found only partially implemented by them at Elementary stage in Manipur. Probably this could be one of the main reasons that the students are not excellent in communicative skill which are emerging demand of English. Therefore, there is a need to address this issue because it may not help future careers of the children in this global market of English. After the identification of this problem, ten schools (5 Private English medium schools and 5 Government schools) were selected for our study. Among these 5 Private schools, 2 of them were convent schools. Of the 5 Government schools, one is a model school where relatively more facility has been created by the Government. In order to carry out the investigation, questionnaires were administered to the teachers of English, who are working in these ten schools; and their responses were analyzed. In addition, the Heads/Principals were also consulted by the investigator in relation to teaching/learning process, evaluation systems and their administration. We found some discrepancies in methods, approaches and techniques adopted by teachers due to which low achievement in English occurs. We assess listening of the students with some of techniques which could be used as innovative practice in the classroom transaction for developing life skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent times Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has been able to make inroads into the ways information is disseminated among those involved in direct farming and farming related enterprises. This paper arose from a two-year study of the KissanKerala, the e-learning project underway in Kerala, a small state in India. It is more conspicuous when we learn that the KissanKerala project is able to disseminate agricultural information also among digital immigrants. Since 2003, the KissanKerala has been providing advisory services to the farming community in Kerala using a combination of technologies. Salient features of the project are discussed. Noteworthy are its interactive web portal and the online agri-video channel that uses the video sharing platform of YouTube. In this paper, we look at the e-learning strategies adopted; virtual learning environments created and also discuss participative tools used for communication. We have also made an impact-study of the project with a large number of beneficiaries. We learn that the Kissan Kerala is one of the most successful learning projects undertaken in distance mode in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the employment and unemployment panel data of the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO), this paper attempts to map the spatial and temporal dimension of skills and education profiles of India's workforce. After an assessment of India's employment challenge, this study analyses the changing pattern of skill distribution among Indian workers by their gender, location, type, regions and broad sectors of the economy. The paper draws on the emerging literature and presents its empirical data to outline the essential skill and educational characteristics of workers, and its variations across broad sectors of the economy at both the national and sub-national levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper argues that even as six decades have elapsed since determination of education policy has been transferred into the jurisdiction of a democratically elected Government committed to the objective of welfare state, the higher education sector has failed to achieve the desired degree of diversification and balance in enrolments across faculties. Though a skewed enrolment pattern in itself is not a problem, it's implication for the functioning of the socio-economic mechanism is consequential. The present paper is organized in the following manner. Section-I lays down the background to the research questions the paper seeks to address. The current scenario of faculty-wise enrolments in India is also discussed here. Section-II attempts to identify the factors contributing to the present scenario of skewed enrolment patterns. Section-III analyses the implications of the imbalance in enrolments across faculties with respect to some selected socio-economic indicators. Section-IV emphasizes the weight-factors attached to the importance of labour market and wage distribution forces. This section also brings to light some externalities which creep into the enrolment trends, anticipating the fruits in terms of wages/stability/opportunities in the labour market. Section-V is in the nature of a brief conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has indicated that Hole In The Wall Education Limited (HiWEL) learning stations provide an opportunity for children to pick up necessary skills to operate a computer and self-instruct themselves to learn new things on their own. This clearly indicates that children in the age range 8 to 14 years using HiWEL learning station are self – regulated learners. The very nature of the learning station encourages children to organize themselves and form groups to use the learning station. As there is no teacher/instructor at these learning stations, children are self – motivated to work at the learning stations. They decide when and how to use the learning station. They use meta-cognitive strategies such as elaboration, rehearsal, etc to work at these stations. The question now is to ascertain whether HiWEL learning station acts as a catalyst in increasing the self-regulatory behavior among HiWEL users. This paper is an attempt to find out whether school-going children who are exposed to the HiWEL learning station are higher on self regulatory behavior as compared to school going children who are not exposed to HiWEL learning station. Though, this study is exploratory and is a smaller part of a larger study, yet the results are very encouraging and point in the direction that HiWEL learning station plays a vital role in enabling children to become self-regulated learners. In this paper, due acknowledgement is given to 'Motivated Strategy Learning Questionnaire' (MSLQ) which has been adapted in the context of HiWEL Learning stations to measure self regulation among children. Interestingly, it also throws light on the fact that some parameters in self –regulatory are more prominent and these parameters are critical to a HiWEL users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the influence of home country academic culture on the performance of international students in their studies. The focus was on Indian international students studying business courses in an Australian regional university because 61% of its students are international and majority of them come from India. The paper describes a pilot study employing a narrative inquiry approach to provide a better understanding of international students' academic culture. Three main academic cultural gaps were identified from the students' narratives: (1) annual teaching versus semester teaching scheme; (2) lack of familiarity with writing assignments; and (3) lack of familiarity with the Australian accent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the impact of education on labour market discrimination against gender by using primary data collected from sample households in the KBK districts of Orissa. Using the Mincerian earnings function, the paper attempts to evaluate the effects of education on earnings. The findings clearly show that: (i) the labour market in the KBK district is distinctly discriminatory against women in both the organised and unorganised sectors; (ii) higher levels of education enable women to get higher earnings, thereby reducing the inequality in the earnings between men and women; (iii) the economic returns to education for women are higher than for men at each level of education and the gap in returns to education between gender declines with an increase in education. The paper concludes that education emerges as one of the influential factors for reducing the labour market discrimination against women in the KBK districts. In this backdrop, the findings in the paper suggest that the government needs to initiate special efforts to increase not only the level of education of women but also their participation in the labour market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Right are those essential conditions of life, which enable individuals to develop their personality and. We with dignity. The Constitution of India, therefore, guarantees certain fundamental rights to individual citizen. The fundamental rights under Article 29 and Article 30 deal with cultural and educational rights. But education has a broad perspective. It encompasses knowledge of all kinds. The kind of modem education through its formal institutions came late. But prior to that knowledge was acquired through other means. The tribal as indigenous communities possessed indigenous knowledge, which was informal, mostly oral and non-institutionalized. It is believed that the prime reason for which the colonialists established an education system was to create an elite who could help in the management of resources. The major critic of the present education system is that it is too main stream forgetting the culture and identities of the indigenous people. Here, what is the purpose of education is also a major question. If the mainstream educational standard of a state tends to be co-related with only the job market, usually, there remains no room for traditional learning. As usual, literacy still is a focus of the education system. Enrollment is given importance. These trends have their own consequences. As Orissa has a high proportion of tribal communities in its population. These are important issues. The present paper would attempt to discuss these aspects in the context of tribal of Orissa. The paper is base don secondary sources of data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is argued that the perception of existing inequality within the field of school education gave rise to the language of rights, but that normative notions of childhood underpinning educational discourses have not been sufficiently problematised. The paper makes a case for productive convergence between the discourses of quality and inequality by drawing on the observations from a study of government schools in Andhra Pradesh. Specifically, the paper foregrounds the need for reflecting on the tacit agreement that exists within the education system about bracketing off questions of socio-cultural inequality when discussing issues of quality and learning goals on the one hand, and the compartmentalisation of the language of rights on the other hand such that adequate attention has not yet been paid to questions of educational quality. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The paper locates educational policy in a wider socio-historical and political perspective and aims at an ideological deconstruction of policy change with a specific focus on the equality–quality conundrum in elementary education in India. It attempts to critically decode changes in notions and practices of equality and quality in national and international policy prescription, highlighting aspects of ideological contexts, power asymmetries and state dynamics and examines basic shifts in policy discourse and intent. The paper is organised in four parts. The first two parts take a broad historical overview to examine notions of equality and quality, articulated in texts and discussions pertaining to the two national educational policies and in policy initiatives introduced by the Indian state under neoliberal, global hegemonic influence. The interactive impact of educational restructuring and structures of stratification as reflected in the aggravation of key caste, class, gender and ethnic inequalities is captured in the third part of the paper. The final part of the paper draws attention to dilutions and contradictions inherent in recent policy shifts to argue that any meaningful notion of quality education for the poor is impossible to attain in the present context. It unravels the politics of quality. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The paper deals with the citation analysis of 3109 citations that figured in doctoral dissertations submitted to the department of Education, AMU, Aligarh during the year 1990-2005. The study was carried out to determine the use pattern of literature by the researchers in the field of Education. The citation pertained to journals, books, dissertation, thesis, papers, reports, conferences, newspapers etc. The result shows that the books have the highest number of citations, accounting 46.05% of the total citation. The majority of the documents, i.e., 2796 (89.93%) out of the 3109 are in English Language and the rest i.e. 294 are in other language. It is observed that 713 of the articles are published from India. 2547(81.92%) of the articles have been produced by single author. The "Educational Review" occupied the first position with the highest citation numbers i.e., 142(10.74%). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses some aspects of the youth sub-culture of Ladakh in the changing social scenario. It is based on the findings of an empirical study of a sample of 150 youth drawn from the town of Leh in Ladakh, Jammu and Kashmir. The aspects of the sub-culture, as distinctive of the contemporary youth in Ladakh, discussed in the paper are the youth's economic situation, educational status, perspective on education, occupational aspirations, occupational mobility, spatial mobility, interests and leisure time activities, dress and food habits, conflict with parents, and premarital sex. The present youth in Ladakh have their outlook on education, employment, social reproduction, and life experiences and interests. Their notion about education reflects the modern attitudes based on economic and market demands, and belief in professional/technical training. Regarding employment, many of them want to leave their native place to seek jobs in big cities or even abroad, and achieve success in their career. They have their preferences for dress and food habits, and views on premarital sex. On the whole, the youth in Ladakh have shown the tendency to be as much part of the modern world as the youth elsewhere in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]