Distance Education: A System Under Stress

About the Book : Distance Education has been in existence in India for the last three decades. Vertical and horizontal expansion that it has made during these years has enabled it to establish its foothold in the realm of higher education of the country. Apart from covering over 18th of the total population of students in colleges and universities, distance education has opened vast new avenues of higher education and skill development for those persons whom the rigours of the work-a-day world either have derived of the opportunity of higher education or have tied them down to those occupations which ill-fit into their living or potential competence. While these years witnessed this system making an amazing progress, they have brought to the surface manifold problems that it suffers from. These problems call for an urgent attention of the decision-makers at various levels. Unless an early solution to them is found and the working of the system is streamlined, distance education would not be able to deliver the goods in as great a measure as expected of it. This volume seeks not only to portray the system in its minutest detail but also brings out each and every problem that cripples its functioning. Efforts have also been made to offer side by side, solutions to those problems. Based on practical experience, relevant documentary evidence, field surveys and, above all, the learned literature, this book provides a vivid and detailed account of the system both in its micro and macro form.

About the Author : S. Bhatnagar was Director of Correspondence Courses and Professor of Political Science at the Panjab University, Chandigarh. Having been closely associated with the system of distance Education ever since its inception in the country, he has profusely contributed to its development and growth in various different ways. Besides writing articles and research papers on its varied aspects, he participated in many national and international seminars and conferences, including the Eleventh and the Thir-teenth World Meets of the International Council of Distance Education. He was also instrumental in establishing the first-ever country-wide forum of intensive deliberations and discussion on the problems of distance education, namely the National Council of Distance Education (an affiliate of the World Body). He presided over its Chandigarh Meet of 1994. With a view to further projecting the views and the research of the learned scholars, he instituted in his own Directorate the Indian Journal of Distance Education. Again being the first-ever such forum, its soon became a lively organ of academic debate and began to be enlisted among the first-rate international journal of distance education. In recognition of his manifold services to this discipline, the U.G.C. nominated him on a number him on a number of its decision-making bodies. This book is yet another venture towards the strengthening of this nascent discipline. Besides distance education, political science is another area of his academic interest. Being primarily a student of this discipline and also having risen to the eminence of its professorship, he has widely lectured, researched and written on its various aspects. He has also authored and co-authored a number of books on such subjects as Political Theory, Local Government and Panchayati Raj. In addition, he has published numerous articles in various learned journals of international repute. Even after half a decade of his superannuation, he has been a pursuing his academic interests as actively as ever.