Digital divide, social development, and gender disparity: a critical analysis of the National Education Policy 2020: ways forward

Standing at the crux of a situation when digitization, corporate monopoly, media oligopoly, etc. have become the new “normal” of a capitalized worldview, the education system in India has also undergone a sea change. The commodification of education has made the divide, or the gap between the rural and urban populations, the rich and the poor, the backward and the upfront or mainstream learners, gender disparity and gender mainstreaming more apparent. In the name of academic excellence and academic collaboration, a host of pressing market imperatives or competitive edge factors are imposed on educational institutions, which is symptomatic of a neo liberalization process where education is no longer an ideology but rather a commodity. And to hide this economic and political rationality behind liberalizing education under the garb of “development,” a series of changes in terms of structuring and restructuring variables to decide the performance of academia in the national and international market have been put in place. The intensification of academic work, reinventing teaching-learning methodologies, research, and academic service, and the increase in various measurements of productivity, efficiency, quality, and accountability have placed new demands on academics to perform productively and reinvent themselves. This study has identified the consequences of these material and affective changes in the Indian higher education system—as is evident in the New Education Policy 2020—and how conducive it is for bringing in social and economic development for all, especially for the Indian rural population. Also, the study will look into the “development” paradigm from the prism of gender equity and sustainable inclusive growth, where education plays a key role in bringing in equitable distribution of wealth and resources. The research method used in this study is historical analysis, semiotic analysis and discourse analysis. The findings of the study clearly indicate that the primary and secondary education system in rural India, especially Govt. or Govt.-aided school have to be upgraded enough to accommodate digitization in the teaching-learning method. Indian Govt. must allocate more funds for making education accessible and affordable to the rural population.