Role of Education in promoting Peace and Development: The Bangladesh Perspective Harun-or-Rashid
As we know, in pursuance of the United Nations General Assembly's SDGs 2030
Resolution (70/1, September 25, 2015) the General Assembly adopted another Resolution
on December 3, 2018 proclaiming January 24 the International Day of Education to be
observed by all Member States and other relevant bodies including civil society
organizations that immediately relates to SDG 4. Accordingly today's assembly is being
organized by the Bangladesh National Commission for UNESCO in cooperation with the
Ministry of Education, Government of Bangladesh as a mark of celebration of the Day.
It is needless to say that we cannot go along a modern decent life, both as an individual as
well as a member of society, without education. Education is like light. It extinguishes all
kinds of darkness from the mind and heart of a recipient. It makes a person self-
conscious, self-confident, creative, innovative, sensitizes to one's surroundings or
environment, imparts moral values, inculcates human virtues leading to develop a secular
universal mind.
Human beings aspire for peace and development. Peace and Development are
intrinsically linked to Education. Peace is not just absence of hostility and being free from
fear of war or violence. It is a state of mind that demands for a positive view towards life,
beliefs, behaviours and attitudes necessary for tolerance of diversity and living in
harmony with others in the community and society. Peace education is vitally important
in this respect, which teaches the art, skill and method of pacific resolution of conflicts
and how to develop a positive attitude towards life including culture of peace. Further
there is a close relationship between peace and development playing a mutually
contributory role.
Development is understood in terms of continued availability of goods and services
required for quality living for citizens. It is a process of positive change, sustainable
growth, equity, and of creating new opportunities and comforts through material
advancement and improvised service sectors. This demands for materialisation of two key
factors i.e., capacity-building at individual as well as national level and empowerment of
women, who constitute on average fifty percent of population. Education plays a key
transformative role in the spree of development. No where in the world any educated
nation remained backward, poor, sluggish or impoverished.
Bangladesh perspective
47 years ago in 1971 Bangladesh emerged as an independent state through a War of
Liberation against the Pakistani occupation army under the leadership of the Father of the
Bangali Nation, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Over a period of less than five
decades there has taken place a phenomenal growth and development in the country in
almost every sectors coming to be accredited by the world community as a model for
developing nations. Contributions of education sector are pre-eminently large in this
stride. Further this may be primarily attributed to the foundational role and leadership of
the Father of the Nation and to her daughter, Sheikh Hasina, the four-time Prime Minister
of the government.
Bangabandhu's thought of education and policy initiatives
Bangabandhu not only dreamt of an independent Bangladesh but also of a happy,
prosperous developed state free from hunger, poverty, illiteracy and exploitation founded
upon the principles of democracy and secularism, a vision of 'Sonar Bangla' (Golden
Bengal), as he perceived. For materialisation of such vision, he put top priority and
importance to education. During Pakistan period in his nation-wide address over Radio
and Television preceding the 1970 general elections what Bangabandhu said about
education vindicated his thought on it, as he maintained,
No investment is as vital for the healthy development of the Society as in
education..... Primary education is denied to more than half of the nation children.
Only 18 percent of our boys and 6 percent of our girls complete first five years of
elementary school. We believe that at least 4 percent of the Gross National Product
should be committed to education. The salary of the college and school teachers
particularly school teachers must be substantially increased. Illiteracy must be
eradicated. A crush programme must be launched to extend free and compulsory
education to all children within 5 years. Secondary education should be made readily
accessible to all sections of people. New universities including medical and technical
universities must be rapidly established. Poverty should not be allowed to deprive
meritorious boys and girls of the opportunity to pursue higher education.
In the constitution of the new state framed by his government in 1972, education was
declared as a fundamental right of citizen. The same Constitution incorporated a
provision on state education policy under Article 17 stipulating that 'the state shall adopt
effective measures for the purpose of (a) establishing a uniform, mass-oriented and
universal system of education and extending free and compulsory education to all
children to such stage as may be determined by law; (b) relating education to needs of
society and producing properly trained and motivated citizens to serve those needs; (c)
removing illiteracy within such time as may be determined by law'. In brief, state
education would be uniform, mass-based and universal, free and compulsory for all to a
certain stage, need based, capable of creating skilled human resources and removing
illiteracy within a stipulated time.
Despite a most challenging situation presented by a war-ravaged economy, Bangabandhu
established 11 thousand new primary schools and many more other schools and colleges
in the country. In 1972 he also constituted a commission known as Dr. Qudrat-E-Khuda
Education Commission to formulate a National Education Policy in line with Article 17
of the Constitution. To the great misfortune of the nation, the assassin's bullet in August
1975 not only took away the life of the Father of the Nation but also put all his policies
and initiatives in the shelves by the new pro-Pakistani military regimes.
Measures and achievements of governments under Sheikh Hasina
Like many other things, Bangabandhu laid the foundation of education policy of the new
state, as seen above. Coming to form her first government in 1996 after 21 years of
relentless struggle following the assassination of Bangabandhu, Sheikh Hasina had a
recourse to retrieval of the policies and great initiatives made by the Father of the Nation
hitherto abandoned by non- Awami League governments. After succeeding victories in the
general elections, she came to form her second, third and fourth governments consecutively
in 2009, 2014 and last 2019 for a term of five year each. During the December 2008 general
elections she presented an unconventional manifesto known as Vision 2021 or Charter of
Digital Bangladesh before the nation based on short-term, mid-term and long-term goals in
different sectors with a targeted time scale of achievements. As a matter of fact, for the last
ten years during her second and third governments, a phenomenal change and development
have taken place in the country in all sectors including education.
Measures
Measures adopted by Sheikh Hasina's governments in education sector include: (i) stress
on eradication of illiteracy, (ii) guarantee of enrolment of every children of school going
age, (iii) special attention to reduce rate of drop outs, (iv) distribution of books on the first
day of the calendar year among students up to secondary level free of cost, (v) special
attention and assistance (scholarships, stipends) to promote female education, (vi) free
female education up to secondary level, (vii) concerted efforts to remove gender gap or
disparity in education, (viii) Braille books for blind students, (ix) books in mother
languages for pre-primary school children of small nationalities, (x) various types of
scholarship, stipend for hundreds of thousands of students of varied background, (xi)
Prime Minister's Education Assistance Trust, (xii) stress on technical education, (xiii)
ICT education in different levels of education system, (xiv) ICT Training and Resource
Centres at Upazila level, (xv) establishment of 22 public universities including 14
Science and Technology Universities and 55 private universities, (xvi) establishment of 5
specialised universities including Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Digital
University, (xvii) establishment of 3 Medical Universities, (xviii) plan to establish 100
technical schools at Upazila level, (xix) plan to establish 4 women polytechnic institutes
in 4 divisional Headquarters, (xx) a ten year (2009-2018) Higher Education Quality
Enhancement Project (HEQEP) to promote researches at university level, (xxi)
Accreditation Council Act 2017 to ensure quality higher education, (xxii) Bangladesh
Research and Education Network (BdRENT) covering both public and private
universities under the initiative of UGC, (xxiii) Institutional Quality Assurance Cell
(IQAC) in both public and private universities, (xxiv) modernisation of madrassa
education, (xxv) a five year (2016-2021) College Education Development Project
(CEDP) for training 16 thousand plus college teachers in abroad and Bangladesh and
Institutional Development Grants (IDGs) for 122 colleges.
Achievements
The achievements include : (i) National Education Policy 2010 on the basis of consensus
among all stakeholders, (ii) against 17% in Pakistan period, 73% rate of literacy
attainment (second highest in South Asia after Sri Lanka), (iii) enrolment of nearly cent
percent school going students as against 61% ten years ago, (iv) reduction of rate of drop
outs at primary level to 18.8% in 2015 as against 47.2% in 2005, (v) starting from 2010,
distribution of over 35 crore 42 lac free of cost books among students up to secondary
level in 2018 alone, (vi) increase of enrolment in technical education from 1% in 2009 to
15% in 2018, (vii) higher ratio of female students vis-a-vis boys up to higher secondary
level (the ratio is also increasing in university education wherein female students
currently constitute 35% on average), (viii) successful completion of 429 higher research
works (including 18 for patent) by public university faculties under the HEQEP, (ix)
relief of 2.8 million national university students from acute session jam.
In place of being a food deficient country few years ago, Bangladesh is now self-
sufficient in food production, power generation capacity stands at 20,000 MW (currently
covers 90% of the population) as against only 3,200 MW in 2006, rapid women
empowerment and employability, rate of population growth from 2.89% in 2005-2006 to
1.2% in 2018, life expectancy from 27 year during Pakistan period to present 72 year,
rate of growth 7.86% in 2018 (continued 6+% over the last one decade), per capita
income to US$ 1752 (only US$ 100 in 1972 and US$ 560 in 2006), reduction of poverty
from 47% in 2001-2002 to 22% in 2018 (extreme poverty goes down from 22% in 2007-
2008 to 11.8% in 2018), which indicate a remarkable change and development in the
country. Contributions of education sector, direct or indirect, to all these achievements
need not be emphasised. Further the recent graduation of Bangladesh from a least
developing country (LDC) to a developing country owes a great deal to education.
Conclusion
The importance of education is being stressed in all civilisations by thinkers and
philosophers beginning with Plato in ancient Greece, Confucius in China and Kautilya in
India down to modern time. As an approach, education is holistic. It is a great change
maker and transformer. For transforming life be it individual, national or global covering
all facets, such as, poverty, hunger, health, global warming, gender equality, water,
sanitation, energy, urbanization, environment, social justice, as set out in the 2030
Agenda for Sustainable Development, from despair to happiness and from
underdevelopment to development through attainment of desired goals, the role of
education would be paramount. This has been globally recognized through the
proclamation of January 24 'the International Day of Education' by the UN.
Admitted the importance of education, it is an omen for Bangladesh that there has taken
place an enormous expansion in the field of education beginning from elementary to
higher level. Rapid and sustainable development demands for innovative education as
sine qua non. Innovative education can be possible mainly in quality higher education. It
is noteworthy that the higher education subsector in the country is also expanding rapidly.
While there were only 6 public universities (and none private university) with only 12
thousand students in 1972, the number has been raised to 44 public and 103 private
universities and 3.5 million students on the role. Now the task is to relate these seats of
learning to SDG 4 i.e., quality education for development through innovation.
References
1. Bangabandhu Parishad, Bangabandhu: Politics and Administration (in Bangla), Dhaka 1999.
2. The Constitution of the People's Republic of Bangladesh, November 1972.
3. Exemplary Development in Education, 2009-2018 (in Bangla), Ministry of Education, July
2018.
4. Achievements in Higher Education in Bangladesh, 2009-2018 (in Bangla), Bangladesh
University Grants Commission, December 2018.
5. Harun-or-Rashid, Bangladesh: Politics, Government, Constitutional Development, 1757-
2018, (In Bangla) Anya Prokash 2018.
As we know, in pursuance of the United Nations General Assembly's SDGs 2030
Resolution (70/1, September 25, 2015) the General Assembly adopted another Resolution
on December 3, 2018 proclaiming January 24 the International Day of Education to be
observed by all Member States and other relevant bodies including civil society
organizations that immediately relates to SDG 4. Accordingly today's assembly is being
organized by the Bangladesh National Commission for UNESCO in cooperation with the
Ministry of Education, Government of Bangladesh as a mark of celebration of the Day.
It is needless to say that we cannot go along a modern decent life, both as an individual as
well as a member of society, without education. Education is like light. It extinguishes all
kinds of darkness from the mind and heart of a recipient. It makes a person self-
conscious, self-confident, creative, innovative, sensitizes to one's surroundings or
environment, imparts moral values, inculcates human virtues leading to develop a secular
universal mind.
Human beings aspire for peace and development. Peace and Development are
intrinsically linked to Education. Peace is not just absence of hostility and being free from
fear of war or violence. It is a state of mind that demands for a positive view towards life,
beliefs, behaviours and attitudes necessary for tolerance of diversity and living in
harmony with others in the community and society. Peace education is vitally important
in this respect, which teaches the art, skill and method of pacific resolution of conflicts
and how to develop a positive attitude towards life including culture of peace. Further
there is a close relationship between peace and development playing a mutually
contributory role.
Development is understood in terms of continued availability of goods and services
required for quality living for citizens. It is a process of positive change, sustainable
growth, equity, and of creating new opportunities and comforts through material
advancement and improvised service sectors. This demands for materialisation of two key
factors i.e., capacity-building at individual as well as national level and empowerment of
women, who constitute on average fifty percent of population. Education plays a key
transformative role in the spree of development. No where in the world any educated
nation remained backward, poor, sluggish or impoverished.
Bangladesh perspective
47 years ago in 1971 Bangladesh emerged as an independent state through a War of
Liberation against the Pakistani occupation army under the leadership of the Father of the
Bangali Nation, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. Over a period of less than five
decades there has taken place a phenomenal growth and development in the country in
almost every sectors coming to be accredited by the world community as a model for
developing nations. Contributions of education sector are pre-eminently large in this
stride. Further this may be primarily attributed to the foundational role and leadership of
the Father of the Nation and to her daughter, Sheikh Hasina, the four-time Prime Minister
of the government.
Bangabandhu's thought of education and policy initiatives
Bangabandhu not only dreamt of an independent Bangladesh but also of a happy,
prosperous developed state free from hunger, poverty, illiteracy and exploitation founded
upon the principles of democracy and secularism, a vision of 'Sonar Bangla' (Golden
Bengal), as he perceived. For materialisation of such vision, he put top priority and
importance to education. During Pakistan period in his nation-wide address over Radio
and Television preceding the 1970 general elections what Bangabandhu said about
education vindicated his thought on it, as he maintained,
No investment is as vital for the healthy development of the Society as in
education..... Primary education is denied to more than half of the nation children.
Only 18 percent of our boys and 6 percent of our girls complete first five years of
elementary school. We believe that at least 4 percent of the Gross National Product
should be committed to education. The salary of the college and school teachers
particularly school teachers must be substantially increased. Illiteracy must be
eradicated. A crush programme must be launched to extend free and compulsory
education to all children within 5 years. Secondary education should be made readily
accessible to all sections of people. New universities including medical and technical
universities must be rapidly established. Poverty should not be allowed to deprive
meritorious boys and girls of the opportunity to pursue higher education.
In the constitution of the new state framed by his government in 1972, education was
declared as a fundamental right of citizen. The same Constitution incorporated a
provision on state education policy under Article 17 stipulating that 'the state shall adopt
effective measures for the purpose of (a) establishing a uniform, mass-oriented and
universal system of education and extending free and compulsory education to all
children to such stage as may be determined by law; (b) relating education to needs of
society and producing properly trained and motivated citizens to serve those needs; (c)
removing illiteracy within such time as may be determined by law'. In brief, state
education would be uniform, mass-based and universal, free and compulsory for all to a
certain stage, need based, capable of creating skilled human resources and removing
illiteracy within a stipulated time.
Despite a most challenging situation presented by a war-ravaged economy, Bangabandhu
established 11 thousand new primary schools and many more other schools and colleges
in the country. In 1972 he also constituted a commission known as Dr. Qudrat-E-Khuda
Education Commission to formulate a National Education Policy in line with Article 17
of the Constitution. To the great misfortune of the nation, the assassin's bullet in August
1975 not only took away the life of the Father of the Nation but also put all his policies
and initiatives in the shelves by the new pro-Pakistani military regimes.
Measures and achievements of governments under Sheikh Hasina
Like many other things, Bangabandhu laid the foundation of education policy of the new
state, as seen above. Coming to form her first government in 1996 after 21 years of
relentless struggle following the assassination of Bangabandhu, Sheikh Hasina had a
recourse to retrieval of the policies and great initiatives made by the Father of the Nation
hitherto abandoned by non- Awami League governments. After succeeding victories in the
general elections, she came to form her second, third and fourth governments consecutively
in 2009, 2014 and last 2019 for a term of five year each. During the December 2008 general
elections she presented an unconventional manifesto known as Vision 2021 or Charter of
Digital Bangladesh before the nation based on short-term, mid-term and long-term goals in
different sectors with a targeted time scale of achievements. As a matter of fact, for the last
ten years during her second and third governments, a phenomenal change and development
have taken place in the country in all sectors including education.
Measures
Measures adopted by Sheikh Hasina's governments in education sector include: (i) stress
on eradication of illiteracy, (ii) guarantee of enrolment of every children of school going
age, (iii) special attention to reduce rate of drop outs, (iv) distribution of books on the first
day of the calendar year among students up to secondary level free of cost, (v) special
attention and assistance (scholarships, stipends) to promote female education, (vi) free
female education up to secondary level, (vii) concerted efforts to remove gender gap or
disparity in education, (viii) Braille books for blind students, (ix) books in mother
languages for pre-primary school children of small nationalities, (x) various types of
scholarship, stipend for hundreds of thousands of students of varied background, (xi)
Prime Minister's Education Assistance Trust, (xii) stress on technical education, (xiii)
ICT education in different levels of education system, (xiv) ICT Training and Resource
Centres at Upazila level, (xv) establishment of 22 public universities including 14
Science and Technology Universities and 55 private universities, (xvi) establishment of 5
specialised universities including Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman Digital
University, (xvii) establishment of 3 Medical Universities, (xviii) plan to establish 100
technical schools at Upazila level, (xix) plan to establish 4 women polytechnic institutes
in 4 divisional Headquarters, (xx) a ten year (2009-2018) Higher Education Quality
Enhancement Project (HEQEP) to promote researches at university level, (xxi)
Accreditation Council Act 2017 to ensure quality higher education, (xxii) Bangladesh
Research and Education Network (BdRENT) covering both public and private
universities under the initiative of UGC, (xxiii) Institutional Quality Assurance Cell
(IQAC) in both public and private universities, (xxiv) modernisation of madrassa
education, (xxv) a five year (2016-2021) College Education Development Project
(CEDP) for training 16 thousand plus college teachers in abroad and Bangladesh and
Institutional Development Grants (IDGs) for 122 colleges.
Achievements
The achievements include : (i) National Education Policy 2010 on the basis of consensus
among all stakeholders, (ii) against 17% in Pakistan period, 73% rate of literacy
attainment (second highest in South Asia after Sri Lanka), (iii) enrolment of nearly cent
percent school going students as against 61% ten years ago, (iv) reduction of rate of drop
outs at primary level to 18.8% in 2015 as against 47.2% in 2005, (v) starting from 2010,
distribution of over 35 crore 42 lac free of cost books among students up to secondary
level in 2018 alone, (vi) increase of enrolment in technical education from 1% in 2009 to
15% in 2018, (vii) higher ratio of female students vis-a-vis boys up to higher secondary
level (the ratio is also increasing in university education wherein female students
currently constitute 35% on average), (viii) successful completion of 429 higher research
works (including 18 for patent) by public university faculties under the HEQEP, (ix)
relief of 2.8 million national university students from acute session jam.
In place of being a food deficient country few years ago, Bangladesh is now self-
sufficient in food production, power generation capacity stands at 20,000 MW (currently
covers 90% of the population) as against only 3,200 MW in 2006, rapid women
empowerment and employability, rate of population growth from 2.89% in 2005-2006 to
1.2% in 2018, life expectancy from 27 year during Pakistan period to present 72 year,
rate of growth 7.86% in 2018 (continued 6+% over the last one decade), per capita
income to US$ 1752 (only US$ 100 in 1972 and US$ 560 in 2006), reduction of poverty
from 47% in 2001-2002 to 22% in 2018 (extreme poverty goes down from 22% in 2007-
2008 to 11.8% in 2018), which indicate a remarkable change and development in the
country. Contributions of education sector, direct or indirect, to all these achievements
need not be emphasised. Further the recent graduation of Bangladesh from a least
developing country (LDC) to a developing country owes a great deal to education.
Conclusion
The importance of education is being stressed in all civilisations by thinkers and
philosophers beginning with Plato in ancient Greece, Confucius in China and Kautilya in
India down to modern time. As an approach, education is holistic. It is a great change
maker and transformer. For transforming life be it individual, national or global covering
all facets, such as, poverty, hunger, health, global warming, gender equality, water,
sanitation, energy, urbanization, environment, social justice, as set out in the 2030
Agenda for Sustainable Development, from despair to happiness and from
underdevelopment to development through attainment of desired goals, the role of
education would be paramount. This has been globally recognized through the
proclamation of January 24 'the International Day of Education' by the UN.
Admitted the importance of education, it is an omen for Bangladesh that there has taken
place an enormous expansion in the field of education beginning from elementary to
higher level. Rapid and sustainable development demands for innovative education as
sine qua non. Innovative education can be possible mainly in quality higher education. It
is noteworthy that the higher education subsector in the country is also expanding rapidly.
While there were only 6 public universities (and none private university) with only 12
thousand students in 1972, the number has been raised to 44 public and 103 private
universities and 3.5 million students on the role. Now the task is to relate these seats of
learning to SDG 4 i.e., quality education for development through innovation.
References
1. Bangabandhu Parishad, Bangabandhu: Politics and Administration (in Bangla), Dhaka 1999.
2. The Constitution of the People's Republic of Bangladesh, November 1972.
3. Exemplary Development in Education, 2009-2018 (in Bangla), Ministry of Education, July
2018.
4. Achievements in Higher Education in Bangladesh, 2009-2018 (in Bangla), Bangladesh
University Grants Commission, December 2018.
5. Harun-or-Rashid, Bangladesh: Politics, Government, Constitutional Development, 1757-
2018, (In Bangla) Anya Prokash 2018.
Role of Education in promoting Peace and Development: The Bangladesh Perspective Harun-or-Rashid
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September 09, 2019
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