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Gender gap in literacy rate unacceptably high, says President

NEW DELHI: President Pratibha Devisingh Patil on Saturday said priority attention should be given to women’s literacy and education. For, the male-female gap in literacy rate continued to be “unacceptably high.” The divide was sharper in rural areas, she said in her address at an International Literacy Day function here.

In a reference to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), Ms. Patil said India continued to be home to the world’s largest number of illiterates. “This is a matter of great concern.” India accounted for 20 per cent of the world’s out-of-school children and 35 per cent of adult illiterates. “When such a large number of the population remains outside the pale of literacy and education, it makes the task of development more complex and daunting.” Pointing out that there were just eight more years for realising the MDGs, the President said India should take stock of the literacy rates as it entered the 11th Five-Year Plan period. It had made tremendous progress in literacy since 1947 when the literacy rate was 18.33 per cent. “But there are still millions in our country without basic literacy skills.”

With this year’s International Literacy Day theme being ‘literacy is the key to good health,’ Ms. Patil dwelt on it to stress the need for paying more attention to educating women. “Better education, particularly for women, provides greater awareness of diseases and their treatment.”

Union Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh said literacy and life-long learning must take on the character of a mass movement which could generate excitement, enthuse people, raise people’s aspirations, and make the literacy programme community-owned.

The President presented the Satyen Maitra Literacy Awards to Dantewada in Chhattisgarh for its total literacy campaign and Lohardagga in Jharkhand for its post-literacy campaign. The Satyen Maitra Awards were given to Chittorgarh in Rajasthan, Kasaragod in Kerala and Uttara Kannada in Karnataka for their continuing education programme.

The UNESCO-National Literacy Mission (NLM) awards for the best Jan Shikshan Sansthans were presented to Nashik and Chandigarh. The UNESCO-NLM award for the best State resource centre went to Deepayatan in Bihar.

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