National curriculum framework for school education :a discussion document

Abstract

In the Indian way of thinking, a human being is a positive asset and a precious national resource which needs to be cherished, nurtured and developed with tenderness and care coupled with dynamism. Education has historically played this important role and has thereby emerged as a natural characteristic of human societies. It has contributed to the shaping of destinies of societies in all phases of their development and has never itself ceased to develop. It has been the torch bearer of humanity’s most noble ideals. In this sense, education, being a subsystem of society, necessarily reflects the main ethos, aspirations and concerns of that society. It is a fact of history that India had a fairly advanced system of education and the worlds first universities were those in.India,/where they presented a consummate example of education based on philosophy and religion and at the same time stressed the study of mathematics, history, astronomy and even the laws of economics and public administration. The Chandogya Upanishad (Chapter II, Sector 1) mentions eighteen different subjects of study including areas such as natural disaster management, mineralogy, linguistics, science of elements, science of defence, etc.