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The transformation of India into a learning society has begun India's drive towards becoming an advanced economy has at last brought home to policy makers the fact that with out educating its people there is little hope of meeting the country's economic goals. The task, however, is huge and, even with enhanced budgets, beyond the scope of the formal education system. States and Union Territories spend an average of 22 per cent of their budgets on education but cover barely 35 per cent of their youth. India has around 60 million children out of school and another 30 mil lion in the age group 18 to 30 who missed out on education opportuni ties early in life. Increasing literacy, following the total literacy cam paigns, has further increased the demand for schooling.  NOS has developed a programme of con tinuing education for neo-literates and early school drop outs," says Mukhopadhyay. "The maximum demand comes from women, particularly girls under 20."

Today, there are 100 million children who are out of school for various reasons, among them poverty, lack of access to school facilities or even just sheer boredom with the formal system. We have argued in these columns that the way to tackle the problem of illiteracy is not by legislation alone, but by devising innovative ways to ensure that education not only reaches all Indian children but also holds their attention so that they do not drop out after the first few years.

As the Human Development Report (2002), 2001 Census Figures and the 5th All India Education Survey point out, much remains to be achieved in the area of education and literacy. It may not at all be possible for the country to open and maintain so many additional institutions. Many believe that the formal education system may not be able to cope with the needs and facilities of school education. Thus the idea of open school-ing was conceived in the early seventies.
The NOS scheme was conceived by its founder members ... They set for themselves a worthwhile three-fold mission: universalisation of education, greater equity and justice in society; and the evolution of a learning society. Thus its objectives are laudable.Here the learning strategy comprises printed and self-learning material, personal contact programmes, audio and video programmes.

While the NOS has over 400 centres all over the country, there are wide disparities in region wise enrolment. In the north registration is as high as 64 per cent while in the south it is a mere 2 per cent. With 17.5 per cent, the eastern region has the next highest enrolment, while the north eastern and western regions account for 9 per cent and 7.5 per cent of enrolment respectively.

The open school has thus grown quite popu-lar, the largest open schooling system in the world, with more than 5 lakh learners
on its rolls, with remarkable increase in annual enrolment from 1672 in 1981-82, 40,000 in 1990 to a whopping 200,000 in
2000.

REALISING THE potential of distance education, 18 states (in-cluding the newly formed), have inspired Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) to "re-view its directions and strate-gies" taken under Distance Education Programme (DEP) for Development of Primary Education Personnel (DPEP) Launched in 1997 and funded
by the World Bank, DEP was en-gaged in building the capacity among primary education per-sonnel (teaching and non-teach-ing) of education are developed in print and non-print forms. Presently, the programme us-es audio, audio-visual, tele-con-ferencing, print study material etc as means to train the per-sonnel. "However, using distance ed-ucation as a mode, a scientific and systematic strategy for de-velopment of primary education personnel, particularly teachers teaching primary levels, is yet to emerge in a vast country like India", said Ravi Mohan of IGNOU...

This pattern is both need-oriented and learner-friendly. It provides for open learning, no age limit, self-paced learn-ing, flexibility in choice of subjects, credit accumulation and transfer, meaningful examination system, multi-media learn-ing package, and learning support cen-tres located all over the country. Any-body can join.

Today, people in general want to en-hance their educational qualification so as to be able to qualify in a highly multidis-ciplinary
and a competitive work envi-ronment. Since their various engage-ments do not allow them to devote as much time to higher education, distance learn-ing helps to fill this gap, owing to its spa-tio-temporal flexibility.
The Kothari Commission was far-sight-ed enough to realise as far back as the six-ties that distance education should not be confined only to university degrees but courses should be suitably developed to make them useful to workers in industries, agriculture and other relevant fields. The growth of open and distance learn-ing systems has been fostered by several factors, which encompass demographic, so-cio- economic, political and technological considerations.