India will take six generations to reach global standards of education

It will take six generations of India to reach the level of education of the developed nations. If the present pace of development in education continues in the nation, it will take another 126 years to reach the top standard of education.

"Though India has made rapid strides, the yawning gap between the standards of education does not seem to bridge soon as the developed world has not slowed down spending on education," an ASSOCHAM paper said.

India is said to be spending 3.82 percent of its GDP on education whereas the United States spends 5.22 percent, Germany spends 4.95 percent and UK spends 5.72 percent of their GDP on education. In these developed countries, the GDP is much higher than the GDP of India which means that the absolute money spent on education is huge.

"India has a resource constraint, but then, the country must catch up to reach the levels of spending as recommended by the United Nations, which wants countries to spend at least six percent of their GDP on education," the paper said.

India has the demographic advantage. It needs to step up its resource commitment to education. India is the youngest country in the world with the largest pupil population of 315 million.

One of the major challenges for the education sector is the shortage of quality teachers. 20 percent of the 1.4 million teachers in India do not measure up to the standards of the National Council for Teacher's Education (NCTE).

"Majority of college graduates and post graduates have employability challenges." India has surplus work force but still India is one of the least skilled countries.

The work force with formal training in India is only 4.7 percent whereas this figure is 80 percent in Japan, 95 percent in South Korea, 75 percent for Germany, 68 percent for UK and 52 percent for USA.