GS Paper I and II

News Excerpt:

The deepest social cleavages – Caste and Gender call for educating and training our young minds in critical thinking for social justice.

How the Rights of Depressed or Weaker sections are difficult to realize in India? 

• An emphasis on racial purity and the protection of cultural values in a hierarchical society only leads to the majority/powerful being dominant and aggressive towards the weak.
• Firstly, the Electoral democracy encourages and establishes affirmative action of distributing opportunities for the depressed communities. 
• Secondly, the State even criminalizes caste and gender-based discrimination. 
• But in reality, this has little effect on destabilizing unequal social codes and discrimination in practice. The state as an organization reflects the structure of society and thus makes the rights of the depressed difficult to realize. 

Why is educating society necessary for democracy?

The idea of citizenship in a democratic society demands the empathetic understanding of the lives of fellow citizens and critical thinking about one’s own life. Enhancing empathetic understanding of others in a modern society can sustain democratic institutions. 

• Encouraging Critical Thinking: Education for critical thinking requires challenging our own lives, beliefs and faith and how they affect the lives of others in a complex world. This is what education is supposed to aim and achieve. 
• Rigorous training in logical reasoning and critical thinking creates the vision that lives in a democracy full of reasonable disagreements among citizens of different religions, cultures, wealth, class, physical impairment, gender and sexuality.
• Awaking of Individual Duties: It is necessary to guide children that self-help and seeking help is not a sign of weakness. However, it makes a human more humane and sociable.
• Making recognition of vulnerability due to physical frailties as well as socio-economic vulnerability is a key step in attaining social justice. 
• Education needs to remove the narcissistic tendencies that are developed to control others, particularly women and the weak. 
• In this way, children can develop compassion and raise a supporting and critical voice for the weak.
• Socratic Education through Schools: 
• Humanities studies move beyond the mental confines of ideologies. It gives a child the intellectual training to accept ideas and also search for alternative ideas. 
• In the present education venture, teachers should understand and accept that social justice education is essential for a well-functioning democracy. 
• Teacher absenteeism, blaming children for a lack of learning potential, discouraging children and physically abusing them are all outcomes of this lack of faith in social justice education. 

Why Sexual education vital for social justice education?

More than providing knowledge about healthy sexual development and sex education, sexual education prepares students to respect gender identities and interpersonal relationships. 

• Respecting each other’s personal boundaries: The importance of consent in sexual intercourse and a respect for personal boundaries, as well as the ability to stop perpetrators of sexual abuse are important aspects of sexuality education. 
• In this perspective it has a social justice content as boys and girls treat each other with respect and also develop a deeper understanding of other gender identities (LGBTQA+). 
• Thus, Sexual education in school will transform gender relationships at home and in society, and will have the most desirable outcome.
• In a recent judgment, the Calcutta High Court said that children have a right to access sexual education and sexual and reproductive health services. When education is a right, it is but natural that sexual education is a part of it.

Need for government support:

• For Updating the Policies: Just as there is a questioning of caste and social hierarchy through social justice education, it is essential that through sexual education, children are given a perceptive understanding of gender relationship stereotypes, guard against abusive and risky sexual relationships. 
• Need for a prudent strategy: Though sex education is a small part of the general school education curriculum, sexual education has rarely been taught in Indian schools. Children, even in the pre-adolescent stage, have a natural curiosity to know more about sex.
• The Adolescent Reproductive and Sexual Health Strategy (ARSH) (2005) and the National Adolescent Health Programme (Rashtriya Kishore Swaasthya Karyakram or RKSK) are two recent initiatives by the Union government. 
• All that is needed is to train teachers and implement sexual education as a compulsory part of the school curriculum.
• Justice K. Chandru Committee: The Government of Tamil Nadu has instituted a Justice K. Chandru Committee to recommend measures to remove discrimination based on caste and community in schools and colleges. 

Conclusion:

The sustainable solution to the issues of any form of discrimination is to establish the fact that all are equal and that empathetic understanding and accommodation of differences are essential for a healthy democratic society. The fact is that social justice education and sexual education are the needs of our times.

Mains PYQ

Q. Professor Amartya Sen has advocated important reforms in the realms of primary education and primary health care. What are your suggestions to improve their status and performance? (UPSC 2016)

Q. National Education Policy 2020 is in conformity with the Sustainable Development Goal-4 (2030). It intends to restructure and reorient the education system in India. Critically examine the statement (UPSC 2020)