New Education Policy: Panel gets 2-month extn to finalise draft

The Human Resource Development (HRD) Ministry has given a two-month extension to a panel constituted to fast-track the draft finalisation process of the New Education Policy (NEP). The panel, which had sought a two-month extension in December, will now submit its final draft by February-end.

To complete the drafting process, the panel has kick-started the process of consultation with different stakeholders. According to Ministry officials associated with the process, the five-member committee has divided the consultation process in four regions – Northern, Western, Eastern and North-eastern.

The panel, headed by TSR Subramanian, had held its first round of deliberation with the Western region on December 14 last year at Gandhinagar.  The panel took suggestions from different stakeholders, including the state heads of Gujarat, Maharashtra, MP , Rajasthan and Goa. Notably, all states in the region are under BJP’s rule.

The panel had fixed January 4-6 for the second round of consultations, for Northern region, but it was postponed to January 11, which was held in New Delhi. J&K, Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand and UP participated in the meeting.

The third round of consultation of the Eastern region will be held in Kolkata om January 18 and 19. West Bengal, Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand and Sikkim will participate in it.

The fourth round of consultation process is scheduled to be held Guwahati on January 20 and 21. At the Guwahati meet, all seven states in the North-east, excluding Sikkim, have been invited to give their suggestions on NEP.  The panel, which has also been tasked to conduct field visits, started the process from Varanasi.  The first round of field visit was conducted from January 4 to 7.