In our Constitution, the Directive Principles of State Policy "have stated that the government should provide free and compulsory education to all children up to the age of fourteen years. However because our population is so large, progress in this field has been slow. Millions of children are out of schools and they do not know how to read and write.
It is a great tragedy that such a huge number of our children does not go to school and waste their precious time as well as their childhood wandering here and there on the road working at low wages in the factories or in the houses of wealthy people to support their family. Children cannot have a proper future without education. Education is the base which only can make their life strong and comfortable.
The percentage of literacy has undoubtedly gone up since independence but it does not mean that illiteracy is uprooted. It is still in existence. What to talk of the villages even in the cities there are thousands of people who are illiterate. Nearly half of the adolescent girls population is without education. They do not know reading and writing. Long colonial rule left us with large masses of uneducated people and the trend continued to exist with the Indian life style. It is said that illiterate parents are not interested in sending their children to school. But this is not true. It has been observed that
though they themselves are illiterate and ignorant, they are very keen for their children's education. They do hard labour in order to make conditions in which their children may be sent to schools.
There are many obstacles in the path of providing primary education to the children. The first and foremost is the lack of educational facilities and the financial burden which is imposed upon the poor parents. In addition the quality of schooling in India at primary level is not satisfactory at all. School buildings are not in sufficient numbers nor there are sufficient teachers. Most of the time it has been seen that one teacher has to control more than hundred pupils. If we talk about the qualification of the teachers, it is also not up to the mark. In remote villages there are no black boards, no table no chairs and no sitting benches even. In such circumstance how can we hope for education among our children ?
Children form a large and very important section of our population. Since they are the future of our country, it is essential that they receive proper education that will enable them to grow up to be responsible citizens and carry out country forward. The government should pay more attention towards their primary education and proper allotments in their budget for this. But at the same time it is a sacred duty of ours also to do something valuable in this regard. We can also promote education among our ill-fated children and prepare them for the new challenges ahead of them. Instead of employing small children at our home for our comforts, we must encourage them to study because their childhood is not meant for serving others but to get education. We mini remember that childhood is the name of today, not tomorrow
