Investment in Quality Education: A Necessary Condition for Inclusive Development

Abstract

During the later half of the 20th century, education came to be recognised as an important factor for economic development around the world. The notion of ‘Investment in man’ stirred a plethora of  research highlighting the fact that expenditure in education and health is very important for ensuring economic and social well being of the people as well as the soceity. Evidence show that education not only increseas the produtivity but also broadens choices before the individuals. Though, many countries recognised this role of education in ensuring higher economic returns for indivulas as well as nations yet education is still inadequately funded in many developing countries like India. Despite lot of pressure from within the country and several intenational committments, India remained elusive for more than six decades to fulfil one of the most basic constitutional obligation of making elementary education a fundamental right. Further, situation at the secondary and higher education levels is also not encouraging. As a result, there exists two kinds of education systems in the country – one, which caters to the needs of the few who can bear the cost of education from their private purse, and the other, relatively cheap, which is substantially funded by the state wherein majority of people graduates without acquiring minimum levels of knowledge and skills. The paper argues that in the present age of competition and excellence mere access to education is not enough. Due to this disparity and pathetic quality of mass education, benefits of economic growth gets concentrated in the hands of the few and average productivity remains abysmally low. Further, the paper postulates that investment in quality education for all would raise the average productivity, improve consumpotion patterns, and increase further investment in education. Besides focussing on the enrollment, education policy should also focus on improvement in the quality of educational outcomes.