Reaching the Unreached: A Study on Mobile Learning in India.

In contemporary India, education seems restricted to urban areas, where it is undergoing a gradual transformation to keep pace with the best practices of education in the developed nations, while it is still nascent in the rural areas. Education in the broadest sense, is any act or experience that has a formative effect on the mind, character or physical ability of an individual (Wikipedia contributors 2010a), where as in India, education is associated with the rote learning mechanism that is being promoted in schools. Rote learning may also impart knowledge, but, it doesn't focus on people understanding what they learn. Meanwhile, the Indian educational reforms do not seem to focus much on addressing education in its broad sense or on revolutionizing education using Information Communication Technologies (ICTs), and new age learning techniques such as elearning and mobile learning, which are powerful tools in reaching out to the masses. Additionally, in the not-sodeveloped regions of India, there seems to be a perception that the implementation of advances in science & technology may degrade traditional values and cultures. The success of a nation as a whole depends on how well its society adopts to current trends, while at the same time retaining its traditions and cultures. This paper explores the evolutionary aspect of mobile learning, and inquires into some of the challenges encountered in adopting the same in a developing nation such as India. This study endeavours to showcase that adoption of mobile learning across different domains contributes to increasing the capabilities of the members of a community, and in doing so, aids the growth of knowledge in the society. The paper thereby highlights the ability of mobile learning to transform diverse arenas including education, agriculture and industry. The paper attempts to resolve that in developing countries such as India, mobile learning can significantly contribute to empowering public at large and rural masses in particular, in turn contributing to the overall development of the Nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]