The All India Save Education Committee is a broad-based platform of academicians, teachers, students and all sections of education loving people of the country who strongly feel the necessity of a system of education in India that shall be SECULAR, SCIENTIFIC, DEMOCRATIC and UNIVERSAL while being INCLUSIVE at the same time. These essential features of education constituted the ‘motto’ for the leaders of both the Indian Renaissance and those of the Freedom Movement who fought against the British Imperialism with the dream that once India became free and the National Government was formed these ideals for education would be achieved. However, their dreams were never fulfilled asthe successive governments at the Centre and in the states went for gradual curtailment of education.
In free India, notwithstanding some very good recommendations and suggestions from different committees headed by different educationists nothing spectacular or remarkable has ever been done towards the fulfillment of those dreams of our former leaders. However, the first ever severe most onslaught on education that the country witnessed came in the form of the National Policy on Education (NPE) 1986 introduced by the then Central Government.
The Policy was viewed by the educationists in general as a blueprint for privatization and commercialization of education that would deny the majority of the students of the country access to education. The idea of formation of the All India Save Education Committee (AISEC) took shape at that time and leading educationists and intellectuals like Justice V R Krishna Iyer, Prof. Sushil Kumar Mukherjee, Justice O. Chinnappa Reddy, Prof. Samuel Mathai, Prof. Debo Prasad Barooah, Shri SachidanandaRautray and others came forward to form this platform. The AISEC developed a countrywide movement against this policy and in course of this movement came up with an alternative policy titled “TowardsA People’s Education Policy— An Alternative to NPE 1986”.
The AISEC fought against different other machinations against education like DPEP, SSA, Birla-Ambani Committee Report – 2000, National Knowledge Commission – 2007, Yashpal Committee Report – 2009, RTE Act 2009 and others. Then came the severest attack on education in the ugly shape of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. This Policy was thrust upon the country most undemocratically during the COVID -19 induced global pandemic when the entire country was under a complete shutdown . In addition to the dangerous aspects of privatization and commercialization of education,the NEP 2020 is fraught withthe threats of communalization of education through the introduction of the so -called Indian Knowledge System (IKS) as an all embracing and underlying feature of this policy along with all-out centralization of education.
The AISEC has been fighting against this policy since the time it was made available in the public domain inthe form of a draft ( DNEP 2019). Having been convinced that this policy shall cause great and irreparable damage to education the AISEC has ultimately formulated a Draft People’s Education Policy (PEP) 2025 for nation-wide discussions and deliberations. Unlike the NEP 2020 which was imposed from above, AISEC believes in finalization of the alternative education policy by taking the draft of the PEP 2025 to different sections of the people and taking inputs from them to improve the draft further. AISEC proposes that after incorporating the inputs thus received a final policy document “People’s Education Policy – An Alternative to the NEP 2020” will be prepared.
The central government didn’t place it in the parliament but the AISEC will place it before a National People’s Parliament to be called for the purpose in January 2026 in Bengaluru. Once the final Alternative People’s Education Policy is ready, AISEC proposes to submit the People’s Education Policy to the central and state governments and demand its implementation within a stipulated time-frame.
This journey of the AISEC that started almost four decades ago shall continue as a struggle to ensure that a secular, scientific, democratic, universal and inclusive system of education is established in the country.
