EDUCATIONAL INTEGRATION IN SOUTH ASIA

South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries have common features, such as geographic and climatic conditions, and share issues concerning the socioeconomic, cultural, and educational advancement of their people.  Education affects every area of national development and deserves requisite attention.  All SAARC countries have a similar education structure, including entry qualifications and age, duration of courses, and instructional management system. But all the south Asian countries are facing problems like access, low enrolment, low enrolment of girls, low GNP on education and substandard quality of education. It is the need of the hour to south Asian countries to evolve common educational forums and cooperative strategies to deal with the situation. Mutual cooperation is a key factor in dealing with these problems. SAARC aims to accelerate economic and social development in member states, which requires optimal utilization of human resources. It has, therefore, emphasized the importance of promoting education. At SAARC's ninth summit at Male in 1997, it was acknowledged that illiteracy was a major factor impeding development of human resources of South Asia and contributed significantly to the region’s socioeconomic backwardness.

Cooperation in education entered the SAARC agenda early with the establishment of a Technical Committee on Education in 1989. At the Thirteenth SAARC Summit held in Dhaka in November 2005, the leaders noted the achievements of the Member States during recent years in the area of primary education and stressed that to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century Member States must make important strides in the areas of science, technology and higher education. SAARC has signed a MOU with UNESCO in 2008 with the aim to achieve education for all. At the invitation of the Government of Sri Lanka, the First Meeting of the SAARC Ministers of Education/Higher Education was held in Colombo on 27 March 2009 preceded by the Meeting of the Senior Officials of the Ministries of Education/Higher Education.  At the Thirteenth SAARC Summit held in November 2005 in Dhaka, India proposed to create a Centre of Excellence, in the form of a South Asian University, which can provide world class facilities and professional faculty to students and researchers drawn from every country of the region. And ultimately SAARC University was established in 2011 in Delhi. South Asian countries have signed many agreements from time to time and some of the important among them are the SAARC Chair, Fellowship and Scholarship Scheme instituted in 1987, SAARC Consortium on Open and Distance Learning in 1999, committee of Heads of University Grants Commission/Equivalent Bodies in 1999 and the SAARC Agenda for Culture was finalised on 9 Dec. 2006. Nevertheless, a lot more remains to work before concrete benefits of such cooperative activities are clearly visible

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RESEARCH SCHOLAR SCHOOL OF EDUCATION PONDICHERRY UNIVERSITY daraltaf87@gmail.com