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| Changed
mindsets get Muslim girls into schools |
| By Ranjit
Dev Raj, Inter Press Service |
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|
 It
was a problem which troubled Imam Moulana Abdul Sattar no
end. How to get the girls of his Meo community, in northwest
India, a regular education and yet retain their distinct Muslim
identity?
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| Literacy
rates in northwestern Rajasthan state, where the Meos live,
were among the lowest in the country and estimated at 56 per
cent for men. The literacy rate for women is 20 per cent and
that for Meo Muslim women negligible. |
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| ''Traditionally,
Meo girls were allowed only Din-e-Taleem (religious education)
offered at the mosque and denied Duniya- ki-Taleem (general
education),'' the Imam (religious leader) explained.
|
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| Across
India, girls are discriminated against when it comes to schooling
thanks to patriarchal attitudes so that the average national
literacy rate for women is 37 per cent against 64 per cent for
men. Gender discrimination is worse in the rural areas. |
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| The
Imam's dilemma was compounded by the fact that his villagers,
in the state's Bharatpur district, firmly believed that the
Hindi-medium education offered in local government schools was
unsuitable for Meo girls because the language was associated
with Hindus. |
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| Finally,
Lok Jumbish (People's Movement), a leading non- government organization
(NGO) specializing in education, stepped in with a simple but
workable solution. It offered Urdu (associated with Islam) as
a medium of education. |
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| Four
years on, results are tangible in the 82 per cent literacy rates
among boys and 57 per cent among girls in the 5 to 14 age group.
Impressive, considering that when the project began, the rates
were 28 per cent for boys and 11 per cent for girls. |
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| According
to Anil Bordia, founder and, until last year, chairman of Lok
Jumbish, what made the difference was the several rounds of
discussions with religious leaders and parents which allowed
appreciation of each others problems and concerns. |
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| ''Officials
charged with implementing government education programmes in
the district never cared enough to reach out and find solutions,''
said Bordia, who once served the central government as education
secretary. |
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| A
broad agreement arrived at, advertisements were placed for Urdu
teachers. Recruitments from among the powerful moulvis (religious
teachers) provided them, more importantly, a stake in the new
system. |
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| ''It
was not long before Meo children began joining the mainstream
education system and, in fact, doing better than we expected,''
Sattar said. ''Many of the girls rapidly made up for lost years.''.
|
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| Dramatic
impact |
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| At
the Kaman block of Bharatpur district where the Meos form 70
per cent of the 150,000 people and where Lok Jumbish concentrates
its activities, the impact has been truly dramatic. |
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| ''I
longed to go to school but never dared ask my parents,'' said
Nazneen who is in the fifth class and regarded as among the
more promising of the first batch of formally educated Meo girls..
|
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| Grinding
poverty in semi-desertified Bharatpur, where villagers try to
wring a living out of agriculture and cattle grazing, was among
other major problems. |
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| Nazneen
said she still has to tend to the family's cows and her parents
expected her to help with household chores such as fetching
water and collecting firewood. |
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| ''But
my parents are happy that I can read and write letters, important
notices and the destination boards on buses.'' she said.
|
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| A
teacher at Kaman, Naim Ahmed, has bigger ambitions for his wards
and waits for the day when the first batch of Meo girls passes
through Class Eight. ''No Meo girl has ever crossed that level,''
he said. |
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| Kaman
block is today a showpiece for Lok Jumbish which began its activities
in 1992 with the aim of bringing 'Education for All' to Rajasthan
according to a commitment made by India at Jomtien in 1990..
|
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| After
allowing a Constitutional mandate on free and compulsory education
for all under-14 children to languish for decades, it was left
to the Supreme Court to declare education a fundamental right
in 1992. |
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| Since
then, there has been progress in implementing universal primary
education (UPE) through the World Bank funded District Primary
Education Programme (DPEP) and through non-governmental organization
efforts, of which Lok Jumbish's is among the more notable.
|
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| As
former education secretary, Bordia knew that the success of
the project would depend on limiting the negative influence
of the bureaucracy and political elites which feared the social
processes that would inevitably be unleashed in the process.
. |
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| ''From
the start, the emphasis was on people's participation in terms
of involvement of beneficiaries as well as functionaries in
decision-making,'' Bordia said. |
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| Between
1992 and 1998, under Bordia's leadership, Lok Jumbish managed
to spend about US$24 million on the project, half of which was
provided by the Swedish International Development Co-operation
Agency (SIDA), and the rest shared equally between state and
central governments. |
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| An ideal
mix of partners |
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| Lok
Jumbish quickly emerged as the ideal mix between non-governmental
organizations, local community, government and international
donors and by 1998 had established 1,500 non-formal centres
with 20,000 girls and 10,000 boys enrolled across Rajasthan.
|
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| In
Kaman block, people's participation meant not only introducing
Urdu-medium education but also making the language compulsory
in the syllabus for all pupils -- a move which helped remove
artificial barriers between people. |
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| Lok
Jumbish also emphasized gender equity and went beyond girls'
enrolment and retention in schools. ''An attempt was made at
feminizing the education system by encouraging the formation
of groups for adolescent girls and women teachers,'' Bordia
said. |
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| Women's
groups of one kind or another were functional in 5,712 of the
8,675 villages in which Lok Jumbish has a presence and are working
to change attitudes among rural families in favour of sending
their girl children to schools. |
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| As
a policy, Lok Jumbish preferred recruitment of women workers
and two-thirds of its staff now consist of women whose presence
serves as an additional incentive for the enrolment of girls..
|
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| Bordia's
master strategy lay in introducing school-mapping and micro-planning
under which village groups undertook house-to-house surveys
to ascertain the educational status of all children in the 5-14
age group and put them on a register. |
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| ''The
register greatly discouraged dropping out and absenteeism, including
absenteeism by teachers, and this made for accountability,''
Bordia said. |
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| School-mapping
readily indicated the schooling status of every member in each
household to villagers and planners, and helped Block Education
Management Committees (BEMCs) decide who needed what and how
much. |
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| School-mapping
readily indicated the schooling status of every member in each
household to villagers and planners, and helped Block Education
Management Committees (BEMCs) decide who needed what and how
much. |
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| BEMCs
could approve anything from providing textbooks and organizing
training for teachers to repairing school buildings, many of
which had become decrepit in many parts of Rajasthan.
|
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| At
Kaman, school-mapping helped, BEMC discover that one reason
why the moulvis resisted sending girls to government schools
was the poor quality of education imparted there. |
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| ''The
moulvis also complained of discrimination against Muslims by
local teachers -- we effectively addressed that problem at Lok
Jumbish,'' Bordia said. |
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| This
article is free of copyright restrictions and can be reproduced
provided that Inter Press Service is credited. |
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