Having worked in education for nearly three decades, mostly trying to draw the attention of politicians to the importance of the sector through research and policy inputs, there is a sense of validation I feel at seeing education and its discontents finally capturing the imagination of the nation at large.What is particularly gratifying is the manner in which education has emerged as an important issue in politics, but also that the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP)-led protests have busted the long-held view among many, including policy makers, that education and politics are disconnected or even that they need to be kept apart.‘Do not politicise education’ or ‘we must keep politics out of education’ are oft-heard remarks, as though politics would somehow pollute education as well as the minds of the young. The absurdity of such a position was laid bare in the protest last week.Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty.The protest, which was born out of the mobilisation of the newly minted CJP, following the remarks of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) referring to the youth as ‘cockroaches’, further used the leak in the NEET exam as their proximate trigger.The NEET exam is itself an emblem of the aspirations of thousands of youths across the country for an opportunity to guarantee themselves a future with secure employment possibilities in medicine. Scores of parents extend themselves beyond their means to provide coaching to their children to study for the exam.The leak then appears not just as corruption in the system, but as a huge financial loss to families and the possibility of a uncertain future for the youth – the latter leading to the suicide of several aspirants this year. In fact, student suicides are up by 65% over the ten years ending 2023.The protest asking for accountability for failures in the system, including the death of the students, was thus targeted at the political establishment, specifically the resignation of the education minister, Dharmendra Pradhan.Claiming access to education is a legitimate political act in a democracyIt is undeniable that not only is education intrinsically political in the larger sense of the term, but that claiming access to it is also a legitimate political act in a democracy. While this was made explicit in the protest, it is important to bear in mind that there is a good politics and a bad politics of education.Good politics is that which recognises both the intrinsic and the instrumental value of education as an equaliser for all citizens and thus positions it high on the agenda of political parties. Unfortunately, that has not been the path taken by any political party.This is evident from the meagre resources allocated to education over the years, which have hovered around 3% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), despite the government’s own commission – the Kothari Commission – way back in 1966 recommending 6% of the GDP. Today the budgetary allocation has fallen to an all-time low of less than 3% (approximately 2.7%) despite huge surges in demand for education from larger sections of the population. This is an example of bad politics.Good politics respects the role of state governments and regional diversity in the provision of education – also mandated through the federal structure of government that puts education in the concurrent list.The current government’s attempts at increasingly centralising education, as evident in the manner in which appointments to the posts of vice chancellors and proctors even of universities at the state level have been controlled by the Union government – a move that is now sought to be codified in the proposed Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill – is thus an example of bad politics.Good politics is one that sees education as the space where conceptions of democracy and social justice, of national identity, and of rights and duties, are cultivated and where an engagement with the social and cultural diversity that exists, takes place. It is through education that the idea of citizenship is also first introduced to a child, and good politics of education takes that role seriously – both in teacher-training programmes and in the curriculum, textbooks and pedagogy adopted.The changes being made by the current dispensation to the textbooks and curricula not just in history and social science but also in science are aimed at pushing a political agenda of the party in power – an agenda of discrediting and demonising Muslims, while presenting Hindus in an unassailably glorified light. The latter extends to claims in science that are ill-informed and un-verifiable.Attempting or seeking to imbue entire generations with an uncritical and politically motivated education, even while claiming the opposite is an example of bad politics.Education is a fundamental right of all citizensGood politics in education recognises that education is a fundamental right of all citizens and gears the public education system towards guaranteeing that right. The Right to Education Act, giving statutory effect to the fundamental right to education inserted via the 86th Constitutional Amendment (2002), was passed in 2009 and came into force in 2010, but the government continues to be tardy in its implementation. In fact, rights themselves have assumed a negative connotation in the language of the current dispensation, with the right to education accordingly falling by the wayside.Thus, teacher vacancies abound in schools; infrastructure shortages, while having improved over time, continue to fall short of mandated standards; learning levels continue to be well below acceptable standards; curricula and teaching methods are not geared towards critical thinking (despite claims to the contrary); teaching training does not include multi-culturalism within its ambit, and social inequalities in access remain. Furthermore, private education is given an impetus through subsidies (in land and taxation) reducing the responsibility of the State in guaranteeing a fundamental right.These are all examples of bad politics.Good politics also allows for the voice of the people to be heard by politicians in relation to the education that is being provided. To be open to feedback and to respond to the demands raised.Social movements in favour of social and political change have been a hallmark of India’s civil society. Much positive change has come of these movements too, especially with regard to making governments liable to basic rights. The right to education movement, which was entirely civil society-based and culminated in a Constitutional amendment (the 86th) that made education a fundamental right, is an example of such state-society synergy.Crushing protests asking for accountability in education or for reforms that make education more accessible and freer of corruption, is bad politics.The protests were an arena of unityIn fact, what we have seen in the last 12 years of the current government’s reign as far as education is concerned has largely been examples of bad politics. From curricular and textbook changes that foster the communal agenda of the party in power, to increasing central control over universities and their programmes, from reducing budgets to abdicating its public responsibility towards education to the private sector, and finally by showing disregard and abject contempt to the voice of thousands of students that were forced on to the streets recently. The brutal use of police force has added a particularly unsavoury layer to the bad politics displayed by them.In contrast, the CJP-led protests are an example of good politics in education. Not only are the protesters exercising their democratic right to demand accountability from the government for its failure to ensure fairness and regulation in the public education system, they are also doing so with clear and non-divisive intent.Many have observed, and this is something I saw myself, that the protests were an arena of unity as opposed to identity-based divisions. The protesters vehemently rejected any attempts at division or categorisation amongst the ranks of students – they were clear that this is an issue of the right to education and a demand of accountability where a basic right has been interfered with.Ironically, the current government adopts a ‘depoliticising of education’ narrative every time issues of social injustice are called out, while continuing to pursue its own divisive political agenda within education. Indeed, it is very much a part of their political agenda to colour the minds of the young and rework educational institutions to reflect their ideological palette.The nature of the protest reflected a clear rejection of this agenda. And yet, perhaps unsurprisingly, the newly appointed minister of education, Pralhad Joshi, is an avowed member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and one deeply imbued with its divisive and uncritical tenets.Thus, even as the protests have been called off, the politics surrounding education continues to demand sustained attention. Education is a defining measure of a country’s progress, the battleground for social justice and the most effective tool of upliftment. The so-called cockroaches have shown an uncanny understanding of this and the lessons from it must neither be dismissed nor forgotten.Kiran Bhatty is a senior fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi and a founder member of the Forum for Deliberation on Education.This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.