National Education Policy 2020: What to Look Forward To

Abstract

India’s first Education Policy was passed and implemented in 1986. After 34 years, the National Education Policy for India has come in 2020, which signifies a new milestone for India’s education system. The policy is based on the pillars of “Access, Equity, Quality, Affordability and Accountability”. It can transform the country into a vibrant knowledge hub. It emphasises systemic and institutional improvements to regulation, governance and promotion of multi-disciplinary academics and research in the higher education institutes of India. Its stu-dent-centric approach will make learning less stressful and more learner oriented. It also promotes a robust and responsive research ecosystem needed to accelerate the pace of economic, social and academic pursuit in India. Teachers who are the cornerstone of any education system have been given a lot of attention in the policy by creating National Professional Standards for Teachers for building a performance-based reward system for them. The current system of education which has often been criticised for being rigid and redundant, focusing more on content and results, will now pave way for NEP that aims to encourage creativity and innovation. This paper aims to look at the education system through the decades of various commissions to the present with a comparative study of the NEP 2020 and the existing policy.