Educational Hurdles
Faced by the Thoti Tribe of Andhra Pradesh
Introduction:
The word ‘education’ has become a buzzword in the
debates of educationists, philosophers and social scientists from time to time.
Generally it is conceived as training for better life and better social
adjustment in a community or group. Education is a phase of the social process,
which is fostered by society for the purpose of preparing its members for
community life in the group. It gives opportunity to a child to develop the
physical, mental and spiritual powers including the development of overall personality. The education
experts have also opined that education is catalytic for developing the economy
by mediating the man power demand and labor supply.
According to Plato (1852), “education refers to the training given to socially accepted habits, virtues and instincts of children.”Saiyidan (1928) believes that “education is essentially a social affair and the school is charged by society with the duty of training and bringing up the youth.” It gives the opportunity for any social systems the given communities for learning and transmitting the culture and in socializing the individuals for good human beings.
Education is a cultural process which includes schooling as well as
training on other aspects of social life i.e., values, customs, norms, antiquities,
and so on. Though education is universal, its content varies from culture to
culture and in temporal space and time. The main aim of education is to impart
knowledge and transmit it from generation to generation. It provides ways and
means for improving the present state of an individual through different
systems and institutions. The over all progress of any country depends on the
development of education.
The educational development is a prerequisite for social and economic development of any community. This is particularly true in the case of communities like Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and other down-trodden people.
As a result of such efforts,
policy makers recognized the importance of education in nation building and
thus more attention is being paid to this subject. It is fact that the tribal
people in
Education, which is part of total culture, means knowledge. It has a vital role to play and its aim is to develop insights and skills of people to deal effectively with their problems. It is a process of growth and development of human personalities and knowledge. More often education is equated with schooling, but in functional view education is equated to learning. The latter is very radical, in the sense it considers education is inherently life long process, starting in infancy and continuing through out adulthood.
The concept of education varies according to time and space, society, culture and at individual level. In all societies irrespective of tribal or non tribal, the aim is to impart knowledge, to pass on knowledge from one generation to another and to show ways and means for improving up on the existing knowledge. Importance of education in terms of literacy has been universally recognized irrespective of diverse societal patterns. For tribals, it is more essential as they were economically and educationally backward since ages. Indian Constitution has identified the problems of Tribal people among the weaker sections of society and has made special provisions to check their exploitation and fillip to their upliftment. Education has been accepted as one of the main means of achieving this objective. Special educational incentives such as opening of Ashram schools, reservation of seats in educational institutions, provision of scholarships, mid-day meal etc., have been introduced for the benefit of tribal education. In spite of all these measures education has made little progress among the tribals.
Article-46 of the Indian Constitution lays down that the States shall promote the educational and economic interest of the weaker sections of the people and in particularly the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitations. To fulfill this objective, efforts have made by the Central and State governments and accordingly made budgetary allocations, but results are not up to the mark. Under these circumstances, various Non-Governmental Organizations swung into action to ameliorate the educational development of the tribal people.
In the post Independent India, various Commissions and committees have been constituted to study the aspects of tribal welfare and development and to make recommendation for improving education standard of the backward communities. They mainlyinculded report of U. N. O. Dhebar Commission (1961) on the Scheduled Areas and Scheduled Tribes, the report of the committee of special Multipurpose Tribal Blocks by Verrier Elwin (1960), the report of the Backward Classes Commission study team on social welfare headed by SmitiRenuka Roy (1959), another report of the Backward Classes Commission headed by Kalekar, and report of the National Seminar on Tribal Education in India organized by the Tribal Education Union of the National Council of Educational Research and Training, etc. All these reports deal with tribal communities in India as a whole, but in implementation level, no effort has been made to overcome theeducational problems of the country in general and the problems of tribal areas in particular.
As per 2001census in addition, any other tribal block in a district , other than afore said 54 identified districts , which has Scheduled tribal male literacy rate is 21 % and tribal female literacy rate is 35% as per 2001 census are also covered.
Methodology and
Data collection:
The present study is basically a qualitative as well as quantitative study aimed at understanding the status and problems of education of Primitive Tribal Group. The study was conducted among Thoti tribe in Danora village of Adilabad district in Andhra Pradesh and concentrated primarily on the community and the available schools in the village for data collation (government Primary, and High Schools, and Ashram Schools, Balawadi and Anganwadi Centers) namely Altogether there are 10 schools in Danora village and all these schools are covered under the present study.
In order to fulfill the objectives of the study, anthropological techniques are conceived as important for the study. These are mainly observation, structured ,scheduled, case study, group discussions, and formal and in formal interviews using detailed interview guide.
The study is evaluative cum exploratory in the nature; a systematic and planned procedure was followed for undertaking this research work. Fieldwork is conducted from 15 -12-07 to 15 -01 – 07 . A structured scheduled was prepared for the collection of data. With this tool, maximum information regarding demographic particulars and literacy levels is collected. Since the respondents like students and parents are agriculture labourers, the researcher stayed in the study village and met them early in the morning and evening time for collecting the data. Initially the researcher had continuous interaction with the respondents for rapport building. Apart from informal interviews, structured interviews were conducted for collection of data from the school teachers and students and parents and drop out students in Danora village.
Data from secondary sources such as books, articles, published and un published reports, Census reports, and government documents have been collected to get an overview of the existing literature and present status of tribal education in Andhra Pradesh. Statistical information on the existing schooling facilities in the district and study area is collected from ITDA and Education departments.
Sample size:
Out of the 28 villages with Thoti population in AdilabadDistrict , the village Dhanora is purposively as its is the only village with a maximum of 75 households with in the study village with regard to selection of subjects no sampling is adopted rather all categories of individuals like students, teachrs,parents, dropouts,and schools in the study are considered for study.
Study Area:
In order to select the study village, a Pilot study was conducted in
2007 in UtnoorMandal of Adilabad district in Andhra Pradesh. Keeping in view
the objectives of the study, Danora village is selected for understanding of
the status of Thoti education in the
context of external interventions. The study village is situated in interior
and having 75 K.m. distance from Utnoor nearby town. The main concentration of Thoti tribe located in the area of
Dhanora village of Adilabad District. The villagers depend on forest and other
natural resources for their sustenance. Fieldwork was conducted for a period of
December 15 – 12 -07 to 15 - 01 – 07 one month i.e., January 2007
continuously for collecting the requisite information. During Pilot study,
frequent visits were made to the study village to understand the local
situation and also to acquire familiarity with the local people.
Data collection:
The data collection has been done keeping in view the main objectives of the study during the course of the study. Initially, all the schools were surveyed with the help of key informant by visiting every school in the study village. Detailed Census schedule was used for the collection of data pertaining to the demographic and other details such as age, sex family details, education, landholdings, occupational patterns, material belongings, etc.
Intensive informal discussions with the teachers on enrolment and other relevant figures at village and school level for tribal students who appeared annual examination, number of passed and failed etc. Attendance register of students are very carefully examined to find out the dropout students etc. Government and non-government officials and other functionaries were interviewed to understand the development process and its impact on education in the study area. Efforts were made to capture the natives’ perceptions on education and its advantages in socio-economic development.
Observation is an important tool of anthropological fieldwork. The same has been used to get a better understanding of emic view of Thoti on formal education. It further helped the researcher in eliciting factors responsible for drop-out. Participation in economic activities and rituals in the village was given the opportunity in understanding the native’s perceptions on education. As a part of this, researcher also assisted them in their economic activities agricultural works, and accompanying them to weekly market, etc. It facilitated to have access with individuals and people less interested in open discussion.
The teachers, parents and students of the area were interviewed through interview method. Group discussions were conducted to elucidate the attitude of parent towards sending their children to school, occupation of the earning members in the family number ofteachers and their qualification and experience the data related to different problems of education in the study area.It has also provided insight into the socialization and other non-formal methodsof education by the Thoti community.
In the entire fieldwork, special emphasis was given to record the Thoti beliefs and practices in the village. BhumiPanduga and other resource related rituals and life cycle rituals were collected and customs and conventions behind those practices were probed.
Finally, data from all these sources have been verified through a discussion with a cross section of people, including teachers, village officials and representatives of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in the villages.
Tribal
Education in India:
The development of literacy among the Scheduled Tribes is very low
when compared other categories of population.
However tribal education status is different in Mizoram and Lakshadweep.
It has reached 80 to 85 percentages. In
other North-East States like
Where as states like Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Goa
and Tripura educational status is less
than40 percentage when compared to all India average and Maharashtra, Gujarat,
Karnataka and Arunachal Pradesh it is between 30 to 40 percentage. Other States like Tamil Nadu, West Bengal,
Bihar, and Andhra Pradesh and
Education development
among the Tribes in the Andhra Pradesh:
The provision of free and compulsory primary education foe all children up to the age of 14 is a constitutional commitment under article 45. In Andhra Pradesh ,compulsory primary education act was introduced in the year 1961 for the children in the age group 6 to 11 years with the adoption a of sub plan as a strategy for development in the tribal areas of nine Scheduled districts in Andhra Pradesh , the government has initiated education development among the tribal along with other economic and health programmes.
The new deal for the tribal not only impressed the tribal beneficiaries but also laid foundation for optimistic faith in potentiality of education as an instrument, which can help the tribal to reach new heights. The strategy has been adopted to bridge the gap between the tribal and non tribals to reduce the gap and regional imbalances. The ITDA is striving hard for implementation if educational development schemes covering a wide range of activities for bringing about qualitative improvement of the education in tribal areas of AdilabadDistrict .
There was an impressive increase in educational institutions since the inception of programmes are tribal developmental blocks in the area. The real education growth started and gained momentum during the five year plan period. Consequent on recognition of vital role played education in all around development process. Higher allocations were made and new programmes like Maabadi,SarvaShikshaAbhiyan all India educational survey (NEP) were added to educational sectors. Even though ,huge investment was made in this sector the results were not commensurate with the development efforts put in as the rate of literacy remained low. In order to enhance the educational status the tribals, the government has provided certain educational facilities and concessions like scholarships for day scholars, notebooks ,stationary,clothing,hostels facilities and midday meals, free ration to the student family.
Anthropology and education , and out of their works emerged a special branch of anthropology of education. Some of the concepts like culture, socialization or enculturation, innovation, diffusion which are of special relevance to education, particularly the education of ethnic minority learners and aboriginal groups.
The education system in the tribal communities of Adilabad agency socio- economic and cultural background, tribal welfare education institution tribal developmet agency area of (ITDA) Utnoor incurred towards the maintence of these institutions, supply of books and dress material to the students and steps taken for the improvement of students enrollment, tribal parents and students attitudes towards formal education, role of the teacher to strengthen the education system in the area incidence of dropouts, reasons for dropouts and tribal peoples perception about the value of education.
The study tried out in the ITDA area of Utnoor, which falls under Adilabad District of Andhra Pradesh . A sample of six schools and Dhanora village were covered for the study. A about 296 parent respondents were selected in order to know their attitude, value and opinion towards the educational functioning of the schools in the selected tribal village of ITDA Utnoor. The conventional anthropological methods like participant observation and scheduled, interview and case study were used to collect the data. Secondary sources of data were collected from ITDA Utnoor the study.
Several innovations on the educational development under way,
attempts to remove backwardness of the Scheduled tribes through education have
been slow owing to various drawbacks primary being the lack of basic
educational knowledge and awareness every person shall be able to benefit by
education through basic learning of expression and numeric ability.
The most primitive tribes majority of the tribal population stand below the poverty line and facing the problems like indebtedness, illiteracy, malnutrition and exploitation. The interior tribals still live relatively in isolation since India’s independence our government is spending some amount for improving the literacy rate the tribals, apart from other population.
All most all the communities living in the rural and urban and tribal areas availed the government sponsored formal education to educate their children, but the tribes has proved to be slow in availing such facility due to certain cultural barriers, constraints and limitations. In order to improve the literacy rate among the tribals certain special provisions extended to them, but still the development in the educational sphere taking place in a slow pace manner in the tribal areas of certain states including Andhra Pradesh.
Traditional
Institutions of Education:
There has been a lot of cultural change among Oraons, but they have still preserved their traditional educational center of institution known as the Dhumukuria. It is in this Dhumukuria that traditions are passed from mouth to mouth, from older age group of youths and from youths to younger to younger ones. The parents and the elders of the village initiate the child into different customs and traditions of their community and group.
The Jonkh - Erpa for the boys and Pello –Erpa the girls were once found in almost all villages. But at present they are not much active. Earlier it was an effective economic originastion for purposes of food quest, a useful seminary for the training of youth men in their social and other duties and institution for magical religious observances calculated to secure success in
hunting and augment the procreative power of the young men so as to increase the number of the hunters in the tribe.
In tribal societies skills and knowledge are transmitted to the younger generation through the process of socialization and also we see special institutions for this purpose the Oraon of Chota Nagpur had their own traditional institution for imparting education to its young once. Dhamukuria known as Joinkherpa is the youth dormitory for boys. Similarly youth dormitory for girls is popularly and local known as ‘’Peerapa’’
Oraon boys were admitted to the membership of the Dhamukuria at about eight years of age and the membership is compulsory. In the dhamukuria institutions tribal children are properly and educated in order to face future eventualities of life and cope ages with the cultural requirements. Apart from informal education the Oraon of barambe have the facilities of formal education . Such facilities for formal education are extended to them through the institutions formed by government or by missionaries however the response to such facilities is very poor.
1.
Holding the school in the
evening
2.
Making reading materials
available to them free of cost
3.
Midday meals should be served
to attract the students and their parents.This will be minimize the diseases
growing out of the hunger
4.
The teachers should not only be
tribals but should be also have necessary zeal and aptitude for the development
of their own brethren
5.
Non formal education may also
be fruitfully tried among them.
Illiteracy and exploitation:
The tribal populations exploitations
by minor government officials , as well as money lenders, landlords and other
agents of vested interest , can largely be traced to their illiteracy and
general ignorance of the world outside the narrow confines of their traditional
environment .
Their inability to cope with the many novel forces impinging now a days on tribal villages and on an economy which had remained virtually unchanged for centuries is by no means due to any innate lack of intelligence. As long as they operate with in their familiar atmosphere, tribals evidence as much personality, skill and even true wisdom as they are faced by social attitudes rooted in a different system they become insecure and often behave in a manner detrimental to their own interest.
Brought up in a system in which all communications are by word of mouth, and hence used to trusting verbal statements , they get confused by constant reference to documents and written rules , which increasingly determine all aspects of rural life. Unable to read even the receipt given by an official and obliged to put their thumb impressions on documents which they cannot understand, they are easy victims of any fraud or misrepresentation which more educated exploiters are likely to devise.
It is obvious , therefore , that a medium of literacy is indispensable as a first step towards enabling tribals to operate with in the orbit of the advanced communities dominating the economic and political scene. The disadvantages under which illiterate tribals labour are multiplied in the case of those who do not even speak and understand the language of the dominant population , and hence can not communicated with officials except through better educated fellow tribes acting as interpreters.
Student’s problems:
Most
of the tribal habitats are not provided with the school due to their
geographical inaccessibility and smallness of the community. As such the
nearest school may be at a distance of 2 – 4 kilometers. Tribal students are faced by
this problem of distance of schools so
they are not going to school regularly.
Experience has shown that the boy or the girl is an economic asset to a tribal family and therefore sending them to school upsets the traditional pattern of division of labour as referred by Elwin (1963). It is well known that girls usually help their mothers at home in all possible ways and boys work in the field in the agricultural seasons .In non agriculture seasons they are usually engaged in the collection of petty forest produces and firewood , grazing goats and cattle, hunting and fishing under these circumstances the parents just can not send them to school at all.
Elwin (1963) has stressed that the factors of the school in NEFA should aim at and has suggested that school become much a tribal institution as Dormitory to attract students. He has expressed his view about the school textbooks and suggested the importance of language so that the students can follow teaching without much difficulty.
FurerHaimendorf (1944) has traced out the back ground and discussed the problems among the Gond tribal children who faced lot of problems at the time of reading and writing because they faced language problems which is taught in the classroom.
Village dormitory is a kind of training institution for unmarried boys and girls. Dormitory is a kind of school where the tribal youths of either sex learn how to perform their conjugal and social duties as also the lore of the clan. Existence of dormitories hasbeen reported among the tribal societies jakuns of Malaya ,thebattacks of Sumatra , the irgots of Phippines , the Borror and most of the American tribes (Grigson 1944)
The dormitories are chiefly meant for imparting social education to the tribal children. The Tribal areas, sense cooperation and competition and sexual maladjustment among the students . The author Nityananada (1958) feels the government prescribed regional language should also be taught to the tribal children along with their own language. He has discussed the various problems faced by the tribal children in the primary ashram schools. Educational systems among the tribals should be taught with a well planned system of education especially meant for tribal areas. N.V.Bapat (1961) has given suggestions that girls education should get priority and various measures to bring improvement among the tribals in the field of education have been made.
Problems of education of Scheduled Tribe students with particular reference to the extent to wastage and extent to which the Scheduled tribes shows their preference for different types of education. Enrollment of scheduled tribes enrollment by type of institution bring the period 1960 to 1961 problems of enrollment of the scheduled tribe children at different stages of education has also been discussed.
Verrier Elwin (1963) has also suggested that school should become as much as a tribal institution of Morung (dormitory). The studies of Aiyappan (1948), G.K. Koppihar (1956) recognizes the importance of vocational and incentive based education in tribal schools as tribal children are showing less interest towards rigid and academic type of formal education. The works of Vyas and Choudhary (1990) research on the problems of ‘Drop-outs in Tribal Situation’ in Rajasthan reveals that the stagnation is the major problems in Drop-out rates.
In an evaluative study conducted by Jha (1985) on hostels and ashram schools of tribal girls, it is observed that like majority of beneficiary schemes meant for tribals, the economically rich amongst the tribal community availing the education facilities of these newly formed hostels and ashram schools.
The number of poor students admitted in hostels was much lower than the number expected and the organizers of these hostels were neither trained nor qualified. The hostel rooms were overcrowded and did not havebasic facilities.
Teacher problems:
The
teachers working in tribal area schools are encountered with certain specific
problems in discharging their duty of teaching, which may include communication
problem. Can understand the regional language which the teacher speaks, the
account and the high vocabulary used are difficult for them to fallow.
The teachers while teaching in the
class they face language problem
as they are not in a person to speak tribal dialect. Even though the
students. While teaching if they used
visual charts and documentary films the students understand lessons easily. Lack
of proper administrative and supervision of schools in the tribal areas is also
important constraint this is difficulty to solve as communication being bad and
terrain difficult, the schools in such areas are hardly visited by the
inspecting staff. This is also partly due to low level of motivation and
commitment among inspecting staff. Which are again matched by the low level of
motivation and commitment among the teachers.
Poor residential facilities for teachers further make them resort to get
themselves transferred from schools regularly. In rainy seasons particularly
they absent themselves from schools for want of protection from rain. Teachers
faced many problems because of proper residence in the tribal areas the
teachers staying out side of the tribal community.
Among Saora tribal students Panda found that the Oriya boys and girls possessed better personality adjustments than the least an cultured Saora boys and girls with the aim of understanding out the nature of impediments and hurdles to the over all educational programmes of the tribal people of Orissa Panda (1989) conducted empirical study and some of his findings are:
1. Medical facilities provided to tribal school children was very poor
2. A majority of teachers felt that the syllabus was not suitable to the daily usage of tribal children.
3. Teachers participation in workshop / seminars was very poor
4. Teachers properly teaching in the classrooms
5. Many students teaching should not understood
6. Many students felt that they were unable to pursue their studies well because they had in sufficient reading and writing materials
7. The relationship between teachers and students was cordial
8. Teachers having knowledge to tribal languages / dialects people cultural taits of tribal people should be given appointment preferably the local educate people who are willing to stay and serve in the tribal areas should be appointed
9. Educated wives of the teachers serving in the tribal areas should be appointed to attract more number of tribal girls.
Socio - Economic problems:
Among the tribal people economic conditions observed to be very poor and therefore large proportion of tribal parents, who get their children enrolled in primary schools due to persuasion of teachers and others , withdraw their children from school when they need their assistance in household or economic activities.
It is common observation to find that a majority of tribal parents withdraw their wards from the school when they need them during agricultural season. It is generally found that a Scheduled tribe child becomes economically useful to the family at the age of 10 or even below as such his going to school at this age is clear economic loss. For girl students there is yet another reason for dropout. Many tribal parents do not desire their daughters who are in primary school to go beyond primary schooling.
A large proportion of them educate girls only up to the educational level for which facilities are locally available .Most village schools in the tribal area have facilities for education up to standard fourth only then children go for work helping the parents and earning money. Tribal people in general are poor and are found at low economic statues. Low motivation for learning, low self estimate and the like create problems in their education.
This is partially because of the existing system of education which is primarily based on urban, non tribal middle class culture. The typical school with its urban middle class values, medium of instruction, system of evaluation with non tribal teachers does not suit the tribal environment. The concepts, ideas and themes alien to the tribal people are generally contained in the textbooks. Which generate negative attitude and inferiority complexion among the tribal learners .Even the non tribal teachers have developed negative ethnic stero types and prejudices against the tribal people. If the teacher’s expectation is low then the pupil tends to satisfy him by his poor performance.
Parent’s problems:
Parents play important role for the child to join the school . In tribal areas most of the parents are either illiterates or not highly educated to value the system of formal education.
Due to the persistent poverty the tribal parents depended up on the children’s economic support in the tribal areas and hence they look at the child as an immediate economic asset. Under this perception the tribal parent cannot visualize the importance of education and feel that keeping children in schools is non - remunerative (Yatindra Singh 1994).
The parents of the children should be assured that higher education to their wards would not in any way keep them way from their children. The scholarships and stipends to the tribal students studying in schools and colleges should be disbursed on time to prevent students and their parents from borrowing money on high interests from others. So that payment of their scholarships should be decentralized and it should be paid in the first week of every month . The amount of scholarship to be tribal students be enhanced appropriately as the present one compared to the living is very low. As children are normally helpful to parents in their assistance in their activities rather than sending them to schools.
A review of the studies on tribal education give a panoramic picture of the issues related with and the problems encountered in the course of spread of literacy among the tribes. As each tribe is a cultural entity by itself with its own world view the depth of each problem varies from tribe to tribe and location to location. And the case of the most backward tribes is much different from the other tribes. Here attempt is made to understand the cultural fabric of Thoti and their and their literacy levels with the following objectives.
