Dr. Zakir Hussain's educational philosophy part - 1
A graceful stylist, a sensitive
soul vibrant with deep emotions, practicing educationist of long standing, Dr.
Hussain is by far one of the best representatives of a secular, free and
civilized India. Known for his devotion and sacrifice to the educational cause
he is one of the chief exponents of Basic Education. It is a great privilege
for the people of our country that two of her most eminent educationists, Dr.
Radhakrishnan and Dr. Zakir Hussain, have functioned as presidents of our
country. By virtue of their office they have dignified the teaching profession
and given a new leadership and direction in national practice.
A BRIEF LIFE HISTORY
Dr. Zakir
Hussain was born on February 8, 1897 in Hyderabad. When he was hardly nine
years old his father died and his family returned to his ancestral home in
Qaimganj in Uttar Pradesh. After finishing his schooling in Etawa, he joined
the Mohammedan Anglo-Indian College in Aligarh. While studying for M.
A. zakir Hussain responded to the
clarion call of Gandhiji and left the college to join the Non-cooperation
Movement with the British. Along with other students, he founded Jamia Milia
Islamia (National Muslim University) in 1920 at Aligarh. To satiate his hunger
for higher education, he went to Berlin University wherein he earned his Ph. D.
degree in Economics. On returning to India in 1926, he took over as Vice
Chancellor of Jamia Milia Islamia, Delhi, at the age of 29 only.
In 1948 he was made
the Vice Chancellor of the Aligarh Muslim University. In 1952, he was nominated
to the Rajyasabha. In 1957, he became the Governor of Bihar. In 1962, he was
elected to the office of the Vice President of India. In 1967, he became the
President of India and remained at this post till his death in 1969. On being elevated
to the presidentship of India he said, ―My choice of this high office has mainly
been made on account of my long association with the education of my people.
It is, indeed a great honour that
the nation has bestowed on a mere teacher who some 47 years resolved to devote
the best years of his life to national education.
DR. ZAKIR HUSSAIN‘S PHILOSOPHY
Dr. Hussain was an idealist. A
clear evidence to this is his zeal to translate Plato‘s Republic in Urdu.
―Belief” to him was an essential prerequisite of character. He said, “Feeble
beliefs must be replaced by healthier habits and irrelevant institutions by
progressive institutions. Our will should get guidance not form the twilight of
the intellect but from the broad daylight of true beliefs”. Secularist to the
core, he was a humanist with a broad vision and never allowed his Islamic
principles and his nationalism fall into narrow grooves but set them in the
context where the East and West, the ancient and the modern, the Muslim and the
Non-Muslim could find a happy meeting ground. In the words of Moraes, ―He loved
India, he loved the world‖. He loved truth, justice and humanity.
He advocated
humanistic education, the foundations of which are best laid in the early years
of life. About reality he says that this universe is real. There are two worlds;
the material world and the spiritual world. Material world is of senses and
deals with things of the world. The spiritual world is of soul and spirit.
Hence pleasures of
world are considered
secondary. The spiritual world is
to be realized by mind through its ideas.
He attaches the
highest value to man in his educational philosophy and seeks to evolve man to
the best of his potentialities. He had faith in ‘man‘ and it is clearly visible
in his philosophy and educational ideas.
DR. HUSSAIN‘S VIEWS ON EDUCATION
According to Dr. Zakir Hussain
education in this country is sadly handicapped. He considers education as the
very life sustaining sap of a cultured society. The problems for this state of
affairs are as follows:
• Sitting for long hours silently
in the classroom receiving lessons in complete passivity in a manner, which is
most un-child like conformity. This system kills the natural ardor the child
once had and transforms him into a listless non-reaching entity.
• Scarcity of good teachers. What
is available in the system are teachers with cruelty, harshness and strict
regimentation.
• Another source of
indiscriminate hardship is the heavy and meaningless curriculum.
• The existing educational system
enables the democratic educator to dispose of the mistaken notion that
education must be the shaping of the educand according to a given generic type,
according to a ready-made educational ideal with a sharp delineated content. He
believes that education is not the process of pressing into shape but a letting
loose and setting free which respects the the unique and specific individuality
of the educand. The success of Indian education depends on the ideas and
principles and how its evolution helps in the growth and development of the
democratic way of life, on how it provides for the full growth and development
of individuality, on how it harnesses harmoniously developed individuality to
social ends, and how it masters the mysteries of selflessness.
To him the basic
principle of education in a democracy should be reverence to the individuality
of the child, the child who is to grow into the citizen through his intelligent
and willing participation in education. For democracy is nothing but the full
discharge of duties to himself and to the society by every citizen. This is
possible only if the competencies are discovered and developed to their fullest
by education.
Regarding the
process of education, he compares it with the growing development of human
body, from its embryonic beginnings grows and develops to its full stature by
means of agreeable, assimilable food, movement and exercise, in accordance with
physical and chemical laws, so does the mind grow and develop from its original
disposition to its full evolutionary cultivation by means of mental food and
mental exercise according to the laws of mental growth. This development of
individual human mind must start from infancy. He firmly believed that the
process of education is a continuing one in which the journey is as important
as the destination.
Dr. Hussain
expresses his deep concern for the fact that more often than not the means
become the ends in due course. It appears to him that schools are the creation
of an evil mind; otherwise they could not have been what they actually are. He
says, ‘Schooling is not equated with learning the three R‘s but it is on the
other hand, a gradual initiation to life. He would like schools to be familiar with
the society, family and individuals.
He believed in
having and acquiring only that knowledge which is functional and in support of
this he cites an English educator:- ―knowledge is idle in a community if it
becomes the private possession of an esoteric coterie. He wanted education to
provide effective leadership in a world of change. Dr. Hussain‘s primary
objective is to provide leadership to community, which gives sustenance to its
academic organ. His views on university education are very clear. He considers
‘work‘ as the main instrument of education. He wants education to be life long.
It should be relevant and provide effective leadership to the community to
which they belong to. This is possible only by learning to respect work‘ and treat
it as an instrument of educating mind so that universities could repay their debt
to the society. In this connection Ramaswamy Iiyer observes that the principal purpose
of university education is to enable one to serve the country in its variegated
scientific and technological necessities.
He dislikes the
peculiar reaction to a problem by an Indian, which he says, is ‘evasion‘. No
matter a university has to face it must never evade an issue but face it boldly
and squarely. A true university should possess a passion for excellence. He has
reservations on the people having patience especially with poverty, dirt,
disease and incompetence. He says, unless patience is combined with diligence,
it is a crime. If a university discharges its obligations well, there is no
earthly reason why a new world of which Dr. Hussain so fervently and sincerely dreams
of may not come to pass.
Dr. Hussain has
his clear view on the long-standing controversy between ‘science‘ and
‘humanities‘. He believes that that the advance modern world has made in the
recent past is entirely due to the application of scientific knowledge and its
application to social and political problems that man is faced with. He laments
that the specialization in each field of technology has reached to such an
extent that the jargon of is hardly understood by those in the other field of specialization.
This phenomenon is rightly described by C. P. Snow, “never was the exclusion of
one branch of knowledge from another so pronounced, and neither was one faculty
so developed at the expense of the other as we find today”. Dr. Hussain
concludes that humanities and science are not something mutually contradictory
but complimentary.
One should
realize the fact that science is devoid of values especially moral and ethical
values. He points out that science is a system of philosophy without ethics. Science
devoid of ethical judgment becomes an ally of everyone – of the good as well as
the bad- and is of service in changing the world into a paradise or reducing it
to a veritable hell. Regarding the importance of education, he said in his
speech after being sworn in as the
President of India in the following
words. “I maintain that education is a prime instrument of national purpose and
that the quality of its education is inseparably involved in the quality of the
nation”.
Dr. Hussain laid
stress on the following aims of education:
1.
Education
should develop a
sense of common
national ethos.
2.
Education should develop higher values of life.
3.
Education should develop qualities of citizenship.
4.
Education should also derive inspiration from
traditional knowledge and real work experience.
5.
Education should develop positive attitude.
6.
Education should develop a sense of social
responsibility.
7.
Education should develop vocational efficiency.
His views on education and politics
are that education is the master and politics is its servant. About
education and morality he says it is necessary to combine power with morality
as well as with science and technology. Regarding education, science and
technology his views are very distinct. The scientists and technologists must
keep in mind social welfare. Education thus should develop the totality of the
child. He laments that Indian education is lacking in the following major
drawbacks.
1. Indian
education has been like stagnant water for quite some time.
2. Indian
education ignores new ideas and fresh thinking in educational matters.
