Discussion on making school education meaningful to vulnerable communities

ActionAid note on workshop to boost National Curriculum Framework operations:

***

Leading educationists and activists striving to make education meaningful to vulnerable communities gathered in Delhi to discuss the National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCFSE). Acting in response to the call of the NCF Steering Committee appointed by the Ministry of Education, Government of India, ActionAid Association had organised the meeting to gather feedback on the draft NCFSE. This is part of ActionAid Association’s commitment to promote inclusive and gender-responsive education.
The two-day national workshop titled ‘NCF Perspectives: Seeking Feedback on National Curriculum Framework (NCF)’ on May 30 and 31, 2023, was held at India International Centre, New Delhi. The workshop aimed to ensure a structured approach to gathering feedback from key stakeholders and enhancing their active participation in shaping the response sought by the Government of India. Stakeholders representing eight states were present at the event, together with experts from reputed organisations working on child rights and education, including UNICEF, Save the Children, CRY, Reach to Teach, Bharat Gyan Vigyan Samiti and Nirantar Trust.
Dipali Sharma, Director, Organisational Effectiveness, ActionAid Association, in her welcome address, outlined the continued efforts of ActionAid Association across 28 states in India to ensure voices of the most marginalised communities are incorporated in national processes, including in the feedback on NCF. Additionally, a comprehensive field study has been carried out, involving communities, children and teachers, with a sample size of nearly 600 participants. The findings from these studies, along with the insights presented in this paper, will contribute to the ongoing discussions on making the NCFSE more gender-equitable and inclusive. Additionally, Ms Sharma highlighted the efforts of the organisation towards eradicating child marriage and child labour, promoting education of the girl child and reviewing textbooks and curriculum with a view to making it gender sensitive.
While sharing insights from her vast experience, Prof. Poonam Agarwal, Professor and Former Joint Director, NCERT, stressed on the need to consider the importance of working with young boys to attain a gender-just society whereby curriculum has a crucial role to play. Rashmi Sinha, Education and Gender Specialist, and Member of NCF 2005, shared instances from western Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan to elucidate the intersectional nature of gender relations. She stated that the NCF needs to consider the intersectional and contextual nature of gender relations. Ms. Madhuri Das, Gender Programme Specialist, UNICEF, highlighted the importance of engendering the curriculum rather than making it gender neutral. She emphasised on the need to include psycho-social support, counselling and social-emotional learning as critical elements of the curriculum. Geeta Menon, Gender Expert and Subir Shukla, Principal Coordinator, Group IGNUS, also shared valuable inputs.
The proceedings on the second day attempted to consolidate subject and section-specific recommendations to NCF pertaining to diversity and inclusion, gender equity and gender sensitivity. Culminating the meeting, Sudatta Khuntia, National Lead on Education, ActionAid Association, stated that the valuable feedback gathered here will be carefully drafted and shared with expert members for their input and review. “The final document will subsequently be submitted to the NCF Steering Committee, together with state reports that highlight regional perspectives. Meetings with the committee members will also be arranged to push the recommendations at different levels,” she said, adding that “Through this process, we aim to ensure that the feedback is well-informed, widely shared, and receives the attention it deserves.”
The national workshop in New Delhi served as a platform for educators, policymakers, parents, students and community representatives to share their perspectives and recommendations on the pre-draft of the NCF. The interactive sessions enabled participants to engage in constructive discussions on the various aspects of education, including curriculum design, pedagogy, assessment methods and inclusivity.

Comments

Lata Mangeshkar, a Dalit from Devdasi family, 'refused to sing a song' about Ambedkar

By Pramod Ranjan* An artist is known and respected for her art. But she is equally, or even more so known and respected for her social concerns. An artist's social concerns or in other words, her worldview, give a direction and purpose to her art. History remembers only such artists whose social concerns are deep, reasoned and of durable importance. Lata Mangeshkar (28 September 1929 – 6 February 2022) was a celebrated playback singer of the Hindi film industry. She was the uncrowned queen of Indian music for over seven decades. Her popularity was unmatched. Her songs were heard and admired not only in India but also in Pakistan, Bangladesh and many other South Asian countries. In this article, we will focus on her social concerns. Lata lived for 92 long years. Music ran in her blood. Her father also belonged to the world of music. Her two sisters, Asha Bhonsle and Usha Mangeshkar, are well-known singers. Lata might have been born in Indore but the blood of a famous Devdasi family...

The soundtrack of resistance: How 'Sada Sada Ya Nabi' is fueling the Iran war

By Syed Ali Mujtaba* The Persian track “ Sada Sada Ya Nabi ye ” by Hossein Sotoodeh has taken the world by storm. This viral media has cut across linguistic barriers to achieve cult status, reaching over 10 million views. The electrifying music and passionate rendition by the Iranian singer have resonated across the globe, particularly as the high-intensity military conflict involving Iran entered its second month in March 2026.

'Batteries now cheap enough for solar to meet India's 90% demand': Expert quotes Ember study

By A Representative Shankar Sharma, Power & Climate Policy Analyst, has urged India’s top policymakers to reconsider the financial and ecological implications of the country’s energy transition strategy in light of recent global developments. In a letter dated April 10, 2026, addressed to the Union Ministers of Finance, Power, New & Renewable Energy, Environment, Forest & Climate Change, and the Vice Chair of NITI Aayog, with a copy to the Prime Minister, Sharma highlighted concerns over India’s ambitious plans for coal gasification and the Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR).

Manufacturing, services: India's low-skill, middle-skill labour remains underemployed

By Francis Kuriakose* The Indian economy was in a state of deceleration well before Covid-19 made its impact in early 2020. This can be inferred from the declining trends of four important macroeconomic variables that indicate the health of the economy in the last quarter of 2019.

Incarceration of Prof Saibaba 'revives' the question: What is crime, who is criminal?

By Kunal Pant* In 2016, a Supreme Court Judge asked the state of Maharashtra, “Do you want to extract a pound of flesh?” The statement was directed against the state for contesting the bail plea of Delhi University Professor GN Saibaba. Saibaba was arrested in 2014, a justification for which was to prevent him from committing what the police called “anti-national activities.”

Food security? Gujarat govt puts more than 5 lakh ration cards in the 'silent' category

By Pankti Jog* A new statistical report uploaded by the Gujarat government on the national food security portal shows that ensuring food security for the marginalized community is still not a priority of the state. The statistical report, uploaded on December 24, highlights many weaknesses in implementing the National Food Security Act (NFSA) in state.

Why Indo-Pak relations have been on 'knife’s edge' , hostilities may remain for long

By Utkarsh Bajpai* The past few decades have seen strides being made in all aspects of life – from sticks and stones to weaponry. The extreme case of this phenomenon has been nuclear weapons. The menace caused by nuclear weapons in the past is unforgettable. Images of Hiroshima and Nagasaki from 1945 come to mind, after the United States dropped two atomic bombs on the cities.

Subaltern voices go digital: Three Indian projects rewriting history from the ground up

By A Representative A new wave of digital humanities (DH) work in India is shifting the focus away from university classrooms and English-language scholarship, instead prioritizing multilingual, community-driven archives that amplify subaltern voices . According to a review published in the Journal of Asian Studies , projects such as the People’s Archive of Rural India (PARI), the Oral History Narmada archive , and the Bhasha Research and Publication Centre are redefining how the country remembers its past — often without government funding or institutional support.

Beyond Lata: How Asha Bhosle redefined the female voice with her underrated versatility

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* The news of iconic Asha Bhosle’s ‘untimely’ demise has shocked music lovers across the country. Asha Tai was 92 years young. Normally, people celebrate a passing at this age, but Asha Bhosle—much like another legend, Dev Anand—never made us feel she was growing old. She was perhaps the most versatile artist in Bombay cinema. Hailing from a family devoted to music, Asha’s journey to success and fame was not easy. Her elder sister, Lata Mangeshkar, had already become the voice of women in cinema, and most contemporaries like Shamshad Begum, Suraiya, and Noor Jehan had slowly faded into oblivion. Frankly, there was no second or third to Lata Mangeshkar; she became the first—and perhaps the only—choice for music directors and all those who mattered in filmmaking. Asha started her musical journey at age 10 with a Marathi film, but her first break in Hindustani cinema came with the film "Chunariya" (1948). Though she was not the first choice of ...

Search This Blog