Kurukshetra Magazine December 2022 - 2 | Monthly Yojana & Kurukshetra Magazine (English) - UPSC PDF Download

 Page 1


Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
Rashi Sharma
Purabi Pattanayak
As per the National Education Policy 2020, “Given the explosive pace of technological development allied with the sheer 
creativity of tech-savvy teachers and entrepreneurs including student entrepreneurs, it is certain that technology will impact 
education in multiple ways, only some of which can be foreseen at the present time. New technologies involving artificial 
intelligence, machine learning, block chains, smart boards, handheld computing devices, adaptive computer testing for 
student development, and other forms of educational software and hardware will not just change what students learn in the 
classroom but how they learn, and thus these areas and beyond will require extensive research both on the technological 
as well as educational fronts.” Therefore, the future of the educational system will be determined by the expansion and 
integration of technology which will serve the purpose of bringing efficiency in educational systems and transformative 
reforms in the academic sphere.
Technology Integration for Quality Education 
echnology is the predominant driver of 
the 21
st
 century which is affecting each 
and every sphere of human life. The 
impact of technology is such that the lines 
between the physical, digital and biological spheres 
are increasingly blurring and is rapidly changing 
the way people live, work and communicate. The 
word governance and e-governance have no longer 
a clear distinction in terms of policies, institutions, 
and implementation strategies. With the evolution 
of digital technologies, 
both administrations 
and institutions 
across the globe have 
been conclusively 
transformed structurally 
and in terms of the 
relationship between 
the Governments 
and citizens. These 
observations are also 
drawn from two decades 
of analytical research 
and the monitoring 
of trends within the 
framework of the United 
Nations E-Government 
Survey. While nearly 
every country is 
engaged in the process 
of digitalisation, not all 
have achieved the same 
level of development, 
and while institutions at 
all levels are committed 
T
to modernisation and digital transformation, 
approaches and outcomes vary greatly. The 
COVID-19 pandemic has further exposed digital 
divides between and within countries and various 
social groups. One of the key lessons learned during 
the pandemic is that the future is hybrid and not 
digital. In fact, the primary objective of technology 
is to recognie and foster human potential and 
support sustainable human development through 
digitalisation. 
Page 2


Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
Rashi Sharma
Purabi Pattanayak
As per the National Education Policy 2020, “Given the explosive pace of technological development allied with the sheer 
creativity of tech-savvy teachers and entrepreneurs including student entrepreneurs, it is certain that technology will impact 
education in multiple ways, only some of which can be foreseen at the present time. New technologies involving artificial 
intelligence, machine learning, block chains, smart boards, handheld computing devices, adaptive computer testing for 
student development, and other forms of educational software and hardware will not just change what students learn in the 
classroom but how they learn, and thus these areas and beyond will require extensive research both on the technological 
as well as educational fronts.” Therefore, the future of the educational system will be determined by the expansion and 
integration of technology which will serve the purpose of bringing efficiency in educational systems and transformative 
reforms in the academic sphere.
Technology Integration for Quality Education 
echnology is the predominant driver of 
the 21
st
 century which is affecting each 
and every sphere of human life. The 
impact of technology is such that the lines 
between the physical, digital and biological spheres 
are increasingly blurring and is rapidly changing 
the way people live, work and communicate. The 
word governance and e-governance have no longer 
a clear distinction in terms of policies, institutions, 
and implementation strategies. With the evolution 
of digital technologies, 
both administrations 
and institutions 
across the globe have 
been conclusively 
transformed structurally 
and in terms of the 
relationship between 
the Governments 
and citizens. These 
observations are also 
drawn from two decades 
of analytical research 
and the monitoring 
of trends within the 
framework of the United 
Nations E-Government 
Survey. While nearly 
every country is 
engaged in the process 
of digitalisation, not all 
have achieved the same 
level of development, 
and while institutions at 
all levels are committed 
T
to modernisation and digital transformation, 
approaches and outcomes vary greatly. The 
COVID-19 pandemic has further exposed digital 
divides between and within countries and various 
social groups. One of the key lessons learned during 
the pandemic is that the future is hybrid and not 
digital. In fact, the primary objective of technology 
is to recognie and foster human potential and 
support sustainable human development through 
digitalisation. 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
The UNESCO definition (www.unesco.org) of 
e-governance is stated as “E-governance is the public 
sector’s use of information and communication 
technologies with the aim of improving information 
and service delivery, encouraging citizen 
participation in the decision-making process and 
making government more accountable, transparent 
and effective. E-governance involves new styles of 
leadership, new ways of debating and deciding policy 
and investment, new ways of accessing education, 
new ways of listening to citizens and new ways of 
organising and delivering information and services. 
E-governance is generally considered as a wider 
concept than e-Government, since it can bring a 
change in the way citizens relate to Government eco 
system. E-governance can bring forth new concepts 
of citizenship, both in terms of citizen needs and 
responsibilities. Its objective is to engage, enable 
and empower the citizen.” The pandemic amplified 
the importance of e-government and digital 
technologies as essential tools for communication 
and collaboration between policy makers, private 
sectors and societies across the globe. E-governance 
has become the cornerstone for building effective, 
accountable, resilient and inclusive institutions at all 
levels, as called for in Sustainable Development Goal 
(SDG) 16, and for strengthening the implementation 
of Goal 17 (UN E-Government Survey, 2022).
With such revolutionary impact of technology, 
education sector could not be left untouched 
and during the COVID-19 pandemic, the pace of 
integration of technology in teaching learning 
processes has increased exponentially. During the 
pandemic, digital technology played an indispensable 
role in holding the civil society together by 
supporting the provision of basic-fundamental 
services in the field of health, education, and service 
sector. National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 gives 
utmost importance to technology and states that 
“The thrust of technological interventions will be 
for the purposes of improving teaching-learning 
and evaluation processes, supporting teacher 
professional development, enhancing educational 
access, and streamlining educational planning, 
management, and administration etc. It also 
recognises and addresses the issue of digital divide 
and elucidates that “the benefits of online/digital 
education cannot be leveraged unless the digital 
divide is eliminated through concerted efforts, such 
as the Digital India campaign and the availability of 
affordable computing devices. It is important that 
the use of technology for online and digital education 
adequately addresses concerns of equity.”
In the school education sector of India, 
technology has been used both in governance 
processes to improve the efficiency and effectiveness 
of schooling system and also for enhancing quality of 
education. Various governance related technological 
interventions have been initiated and undertaken by 
the Government which are given below: 
(i) UDISE+(https://dashboard.udiseplus.gov.
in): It is a well-known fact that timely and 
accurate data is the basis of sound and effective 
planning and decision-making. Realising the 
need of this, Ministry of Education (MoE) had 
initiated Unified District Information System for 
Education (UDISE) in 2012-13 integrating DISE 
for elementary and secondary education which 
is one of the largest Management Information 
Systems for School Education covering more 
than 1.5 million schools, 9.6 million teachers 
and 264 million children.
UDISE+ is an updated and improved version 
of UDISE. This is now online and has been 
collecting data in real-time since 2018-19. 
UDISE+ provides robust, real-time, and credible 
information for an objective evaluation of 
the system, which can be used for designing 
evidence based specific interventions for 
improvement in the school education sector.
Further, UDISE+ has a mandate of collecting 
information from all recognised and 
unrecognised schools which are imparting 
formal education from Pre-primary to XII.
UDISE+, collects information through an online 
Data Collection Form (DCF) on parameters 
ranging from students, schools, teachers, 
infrastructure, enrolments, examination results 
etc. Ever since its introduction, UDISE+ has 
acquired the status of the official database 
of the MoE and is now operational in all the 
districts of the country.
(ii) Performance Grading Index(PGI) (https://pgi.
udiseplus.gov.in): The PGI is a tool to provide 
insights on the status of school education and 
to catalyse transformational change in the 
Page 3


Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
Rashi Sharma
Purabi Pattanayak
As per the National Education Policy 2020, “Given the explosive pace of technological development allied with the sheer 
creativity of tech-savvy teachers and entrepreneurs including student entrepreneurs, it is certain that technology will impact 
education in multiple ways, only some of which can be foreseen at the present time. New technologies involving artificial 
intelligence, machine learning, block chains, smart boards, handheld computing devices, adaptive computer testing for 
student development, and other forms of educational software and hardware will not just change what students learn in the 
classroom but how they learn, and thus these areas and beyond will require extensive research both on the technological 
as well as educational fronts.” Therefore, the future of the educational system will be determined by the expansion and 
integration of technology which will serve the purpose of bringing efficiency in educational systems and transformative 
reforms in the academic sphere.
Technology Integration for Quality Education 
echnology is the predominant driver of 
the 21
st
 century which is affecting each 
and every sphere of human life. The 
impact of technology is such that the lines 
between the physical, digital and biological spheres 
are increasingly blurring and is rapidly changing 
the way people live, work and communicate. The 
word governance and e-governance have no longer 
a clear distinction in terms of policies, institutions, 
and implementation strategies. With the evolution 
of digital technologies, 
both administrations 
and institutions 
across the globe have 
been conclusively 
transformed structurally 
and in terms of the 
relationship between 
the Governments 
and citizens. These 
observations are also 
drawn from two decades 
of analytical research 
and the monitoring 
of trends within the 
framework of the United 
Nations E-Government 
Survey. While nearly 
every country is 
engaged in the process 
of digitalisation, not all 
have achieved the same 
level of development, 
and while institutions at 
all levels are committed 
T
to modernisation and digital transformation, 
approaches and outcomes vary greatly. The 
COVID-19 pandemic has further exposed digital 
divides between and within countries and various 
social groups. One of the key lessons learned during 
the pandemic is that the future is hybrid and not 
digital. In fact, the primary objective of technology 
is to recognie and foster human potential and 
support sustainable human development through 
digitalisation. 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
The UNESCO definition (www.unesco.org) of 
e-governance is stated as “E-governance is the public 
sector’s use of information and communication 
technologies with the aim of improving information 
and service delivery, encouraging citizen 
participation in the decision-making process and 
making government more accountable, transparent 
and effective. E-governance involves new styles of 
leadership, new ways of debating and deciding policy 
and investment, new ways of accessing education, 
new ways of listening to citizens and new ways of 
organising and delivering information and services. 
E-governance is generally considered as a wider 
concept than e-Government, since it can bring a 
change in the way citizens relate to Government eco 
system. E-governance can bring forth new concepts 
of citizenship, both in terms of citizen needs and 
responsibilities. Its objective is to engage, enable 
and empower the citizen.” The pandemic amplified 
the importance of e-government and digital 
technologies as essential tools for communication 
and collaboration between policy makers, private 
sectors and societies across the globe. E-governance 
has become the cornerstone for building effective, 
accountable, resilient and inclusive institutions at all 
levels, as called for in Sustainable Development Goal 
(SDG) 16, and for strengthening the implementation 
of Goal 17 (UN E-Government Survey, 2022).
With such revolutionary impact of technology, 
education sector could not be left untouched 
and during the COVID-19 pandemic, the pace of 
integration of technology in teaching learning 
processes has increased exponentially. During the 
pandemic, digital technology played an indispensable 
role in holding the civil society together by 
supporting the provision of basic-fundamental 
services in the field of health, education, and service 
sector. National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 gives 
utmost importance to technology and states that 
“The thrust of technological interventions will be 
for the purposes of improving teaching-learning 
and evaluation processes, supporting teacher 
professional development, enhancing educational 
access, and streamlining educational planning, 
management, and administration etc. It also 
recognises and addresses the issue of digital divide 
and elucidates that “the benefits of online/digital 
education cannot be leveraged unless the digital 
divide is eliminated through concerted efforts, such 
as the Digital India campaign and the availability of 
affordable computing devices. It is important that 
the use of technology for online and digital education 
adequately addresses concerns of equity.”
In the school education sector of India, 
technology has been used both in governance 
processes to improve the efficiency and effectiveness 
of schooling system and also for enhancing quality of 
education. Various governance related technological 
interventions have been initiated and undertaken by 
the Government which are given below: 
(i) UDISE+(https://dashboard.udiseplus.gov.
in): It is a well-known fact that timely and 
accurate data is the basis of sound and effective 
planning and decision-making. Realising the 
need of this, Ministry of Education (MoE) had 
initiated Unified District Information System for 
Education (UDISE) in 2012-13 integrating DISE 
for elementary and secondary education which 
is one of the largest Management Information 
Systems for School Education covering more 
than 1.5 million schools, 9.6 million teachers 
and 264 million children.
UDISE+ is an updated and improved version 
of UDISE. This is now online and has been 
collecting data in real-time since 2018-19. 
UDISE+ provides robust, real-time, and credible 
information for an objective evaluation of 
the system, which can be used for designing 
evidence based specific interventions for 
improvement in the school education sector.
Further, UDISE+ has a mandate of collecting 
information from all recognised and 
unrecognised schools which are imparting 
formal education from Pre-primary to XII.
UDISE+, collects information through an online 
Data Collection Form (DCF) on parameters 
ranging from students, schools, teachers, 
infrastructure, enrolments, examination results 
etc. Ever since its introduction, UDISE+ has 
acquired the status of the official database 
of the MoE and is now operational in all the 
districts of the country.
(ii) Performance Grading Index(PGI) (https://pgi.
udiseplus.gov.in): The PGI is a tool to provide 
insights on the status of school education and 
to catalyse transformational change in the 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 21 20
States/UTs on the basis of key indicators that 
drive their performance and critical areas for 
improvement.It grades all States/UTs on their 
performance across 77 indicators on school 
education and helps identify gaps thereby 
enabling all States/UTs to design appropriate 
interventions to bridge them. This was 
introduced from 2018-19. 
In addition to the State PGI, around 83 
indicators have been developed for Districtsto 
grade the performance in school education.
Combined report for the years 2018-19 & 2019-
20 can be accessed at https://pgi.udiseplus.gov.
in/#/home. 
The exercise envisages that the Index will propel 
the States/UTs towards undertaking multi-
pronged interventions that will bring about the 
much-desired optimal education outcomes. 
The purpose of this PGI therefore is to help the 
States/UTs to pinpoint the gaps and accordingly 
prioritise areas for intervention to ensure that 
the school education system is robust at every 
level. 
(iii) Online survey platform for National 
Curriculum Framework (NCF): With the arrival 
of NEP 2020, the focus of education has 
move towards learning about how to think 
critically, solve problems, how to be creative 
and multidisciplinary, and how to innovate, 
adapt, and absorb new material in changing 
fields. Pedagogy is expected to evolve to 
make education more experiential, holistic, 
integrated, inquiry-driven, discovery-oriented, 
learner-centred, flexible, andenjoyable. To 
make the above expectations a reality, a new 
NCF is being developed by the NCERT. The 
development of this framework is unique in 
many ways as it is adopting a ‘bottom-up’ 
approach in which suggestions are invited from 
all stakeholders on the basis of which new 
NCF will be developed and on 29 July 2022, a 
mobile/online survey for NCF was launched.
In addition, drawing insights from citizen-centric 
process of development of NEP 2020, this 
framework has also been made consultative. To 
ensure participation of each and every citizen 
of the country in this curriculum development 
process, a citizen-centric Digital Survey 
for National Curriculum - DiSanc has been 
launched. Under this survey, suggestions and 
feedback has been collected from the public at 
large for the formulation of the NCFs.
(iv) NDEAR (National Digital Education 
Architecture) (https://www.ndear.gov.in) and 
Vidya Samiksha Kendra: 
NDEAR has been launched with a larger vision to 
create a unifying national digital infrastructure 
to energise and catalyse the education 
ecosystem. NDEAR has been conceived as 
a unifying National Digital infrastructure to 
energise and catalyse the education ecosystem. 
The core idea of NDEAR is to facilitate achieving 
the goals laid down by NEP 2020, through a 
digital infrastructure for innovations in the 
education ecosystem, ensuring autonomy and 
participation of all the relevant stakeholders. 
NDEAR will enable a common set of principles 
and approaches to be followed in building, 
using, and re-using technology for education. 
Further, Vidya Samiksha Kendra (VSK) has 
been set-up at national level at NCERT and is 
aimed at leveraging data and technology to 
bring a big leap in learning outcomes. VSK will 
include Student, Teacher and School registry 
which will bring synergy to the work being 
done in the ecosystem by integrating data from 
different datasets and empowers students, 
teachers, and parents to bridge the gap. This 
will cover the entire data of school eco-system 
and will analyse by using big data analysis, 
artificial intelligence and machine learning in 
order to enhance the overall monitoring of 
the education system and thereby improving 
learning outcomes. All States and UTs have 
been provided financial support under Samagra 
Shiksha scheme for setting up VSKs. 
(v) PRABANDH (http://samagrashiksha.in): 
Department of School Education and Literacy 
had launched PRABANDH - Project Appraisal, 
Budgeting Achievements and Data Handling 
System in 2020. This System has been developed 
under Samagra Shiksha as a significant step 
towards leveraging technology to enhance 
efficiency and manage the implementation of 
the Centrally Sponsored Integrated Scheme 
Page 4


Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
Rashi Sharma
Purabi Pattanayak
As per the National Education Policy 2020, “Given the explosive pace of technological development allied with the sheer 
creativity of tech-savvy teachers and entrepreneurs including student entrepreneurs, it is certain that technology will impact 
education in multiple ways, only some of which can be foreseen at the present time. New technologies involving artificial 
intelligence, machine learning, block chains, smart boards, handheld computing devices, adaptive computer testing for 
student development, and other forms of educational software and hardware will not just change what students learn in the 
classroom but how they learn, and thus these areas and beyond will require extensive research both on the technological 
as well as educational fronts.” Therefore, the future of the educational system will be determined by the expansion and 
integration of technology which will serve the purpose of bringing efficiency in educational systems and transformative 
reforms in the academic sphere.
Technology Integration for Quality Education 
echnology is the predominant driver of 
the 21
st
 century which is affecting each 
and every sphere of human life. The 
impact of technology is such that the lines 
between the physical, digital and biological spheres 
are increasingly blurring and is rapidly changing 
the way people live, work and communicate. The 
word governance and e-governance have no longer 
a clear distinction in terms of policies, institutions, 
and implementation strategies. With the evolution 
of digital technologies, 
both administrations 
and institutions 
across the globe have 
been conclusively 
transformed structurally 
and in terms of the 
relationship between 
the Governments 
and citizens. These 
observations are also 
drawn from two decades 
of analytical research 
and the monitoring 
of trends within the 
framework of the United 
Nations E-Government 
Survey. While nearly 
every country is 
engaged in the process 
of digitalisation, not all 
have achieved the same 
level of development, 
and while institutions at 
all levels are committed 
T
to modernisation and digital transformation, 
approaches and outcomes vary greatly. The 
COVID-19 pandemic has further exposed digital 
divides between and within countries and various 
social groups. One of the key lessons learned during 
the pandemic is that the future is hybrid and not 
digital. In fact, the primary objective of technology 
is to recognie and foster human potential and 
support sustainable human development through 
digitalisation. 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
The UNESCO definition (www.unesco.org) of 
e-governance is stated as “E-governance is the public 
sector’s use of information and communication 
technologies with the aim of improving information 
and service delivery, encouraging citizen 
participation in the decision-making process and 
making government more accountable, transparent 
and effective. E-governance involves new styles of 
leadership, new ways of debating and deciding policy 
and investment, new ways of accessing education, 
new ways of listening to citizens and new ways of 
organising and delivering information and services. 
E-governance is generally considered as a wider 
concept than e-Government, since it can bring a 
change in the way citizens relate to Government eco 
system. E-governance can bring forth new concepts 
of citizenship, both in terms of citizen needs and 
responsibilities. Its objective is to engage, enable 
and empower the citizen.” The pandemic amplified 
the importance of e-government and digital 
technologies as essential tools for communication 
and collaboration between policy makers, private 
sectors and societies across the globe. E-governance 
has become the cornerstone for building effective, 
accountable, resilient and inclusive institutions at all 
levels, as called for in Sustainable Development Goal 
(SDG) 16, and for strengthening the implementation 
of Goal 17 (UN E-Government Survey, 2022).
With such revolutionary impact of technology, 
education sector could not be left untouched 
and during the COVID-19 pandemic, the pace of 
integration of technology in teaching learning 
processes has increased exponentially. During the 
pandemic, digital technology played an indispensable 
role in holding the civil society together by 
supporting the provision of basic-fundamental 
services in the field of health, education, and service 
sector. National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 gives 
utmost importance to technology and states that 
“The thrust of technological interventions will be 
for the purposes of improving teaching-learning 
and evaluation processes, supporting teacher 
professional development, enhancing educational 
access, and streamlining educational planning, 
management, and administration etc. It also 
recognises and addresses the issue of digital divide 
and elucidates that “the benefits of online/digital 
education cannot be leveraged unless the digital 
divide is eliminated through concerted efforts, such 
as the Digital India campaign and the availability of 
affordable computing devices. It is important that 
the use of technology for online and digital education 
adequately addresses concerns of equity.”
In the school education sector of India, 
technology has been used both in governance 
processes to improve the efficiency and effectiveness 
of schooling system and also for enhancing quality of 
education. Various governance related technological 
interventions have been initiated and undertaken by 
the Government which are given below: 
(i) UDISE+(https://dashboard.udiseplus.gov.
in): It is a well-known fact that timely and 
accurate data is the basis of sound and effective 
planning and decision-making. Realising the 
need of this, Ministry of Education (MoE) had 
initiated Unified District Information System for 
Education (UDISE) in 2012-13 integrating DISE 
for elementary and secondary education which 
is one of the largest Management Information 
Systems for School Education covering more 
than 1.5 million schools, 9.6 million teachers 
and 264 million children.
UDISE+ is an updated and improved version 
of UDISE. This is now online and has been 
collecting data in real-time since 2018-19. 
UDISE+ provides robust, real-time, and credible 
information for an objective evaluation of 
the system, which can be used for designing 
evidence based specific interventions for 
improvement in the school education sector.
Further, UDISE+ has a mandate of collecting 
information from all recognised and 
unrecognised schools which are imparting 
formal education from Pre-primary to XII.
UDISE+, collects information through an online 
Data Collection Form (DCF) on parameters 
ranging from students, schools, teachers, 
infrastructure, enrolments, examination results 
etc. Ever since its introduction, UDISE+ has 
acquired the status of the official database 
of the MoE and is now operational in all the 
districts of the country.
(ii) Performance Grading Index(PGI) (https://pgi.
udiseplus.gov.in): The PGI is a tool to provide 
insights on the status of school education and 
to catalyse transformational change in the 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 21 20
States/UTs on the basis of key indicators that 
drive their performance and critical areas for 
improvement.It grades all States/UTs on their 
performance across 77 indicators on school 
education and helps identify gaps thereby 
enabling all States/UTs to design appropriate 
interventions to bridge them. This was 
introduced from 2018-19. 
In addition to the State PGI, around 83 
indicators have been developed for Districtsto 
grade the performance in school education.
Combined report for the years 2018-19 & 2019-
20 can be accessed at https://pgi.udiseplus.gov.
in/#/home. 
The exercise envisages that the Index will propel 
the States/UTs towards undertaking multi-
pronged interventions that will bring about the 
much-desired optimal education outcomes. 
The purpose of this PGI therefore is to help the 
States/UTs to pinpoint the gaps and accordingly 
prioritise areas for intervention to ensure that 
the school education system is robust at every 
level. 
(iii) Online survey platform for National 
Curriculum Framework (NCF): With the arrival 
of NEP 2020, the focus of education has 
move towards learning about how to think 
critically, solve problems, how to be creative 
and multidisciplinary, and how to innovate, 
adapt, and absorb new material in changing 
fields. Pedagogy is expected to evolve to 
make education more experiential, holistic, 
integrated, inquiry-driven, discovery-oriented, 
learner-centred, flexible, andenjoyable. To 
make the above expectations a reality, a new 
NCF is being developed by the NCERT. The 
development of this framework is unique in 
many ways as it is adopting a ‘bottom-up’ 
approach in which suggestions are invited from 
all stakeholders on the basis of which new 
NCF will be developed and on 29 July 2022, a 
mobile/online survey for NCF was launched.
In addition, drawing insights from citizen-centric 
process of development of NEP 2020, this 
framework has also been made consultative. To 
ensure participation of each and every citizen 
of the country in this curriculum development 
process, a citizen-centric Digital Survey 
for National Curriculum - DiSanc has been 
launched. Under this survey, suggestions and 
feedback has been collected from the public at 
large for the formulation of the NCFs.
(iv) NDEAR (National Digital Education 
Architecture) (https://www.ndear.gov.in) and 
Vidya Samiksha Kendra: 
NDEAR has been launched with a larger vision to 
create a unifying national digital infrastructure 
to energise and catalyse the education 
ecosystem. NDEAR has been conceived as 
a unifying National Digital infrastructure to 
energise and catalyse the education ecosystem. 
The core idea of NDEAR is to facilitate achieving 
the goals laid down by NEP 2020, through a 
digital infrastructure for innovations in the 
education ecosystem, ensuring autonomy and 
participation of all the relevant stakeholders. 
NDEAR will enable a common set of principles 
and approaches to be followed in building, 
using, and re-using technology for education. 
Further, Vidya Samiksha Kendra (VSK) has 
been set-up at national level at NCERT and is 
aimed at leveraging data and technology to 
bring a big leap in learning outcomes. VSK will 
include Student, Teacher and School registry 
which will bring synergy to the work being 
done in the ecosystem by integrating data from 
different datasets and empowers students, 
teachers, and parents to bridge the gap. This 
will cover the entire data of school eco-system 
and will analyse by using big data analysis, 
artificial intelligence and machine learning in 
order to enhance the overall monitoring of 
the education system and thereby improving 
learning outcomes. All States and UTs have 
been provided financial support under Samagra 
Shiksha scheme for setting up VSKs. 
(v) PRABANDH (http://samagrashiksha.in): 
Department of School Education and Literacy 
had launched PRABANDH - Project Appraisal, 
Budgeting Achievements and Data Handling 
System in 2020. This System has been developed 
under Samagra Shiksha as a significant step 
towards leveraging technology to enhance 
efficiency and manage the implementation of 
the Centrally Sponsored Integrated Scheme 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 21 20
for School Education. PRABANDH System can 
be accessed at www.samagrashiksha.in. It has 
more than 10 lakh activated users and can be 
accessed from the School, Block, District and 
State Level. 
A data visualisation dashboard has been 
created in the PRABANDH System for display 
of monthly status of physical and financial 
progress under the major interventions of 
Samagra Shiksha such as text books, uniforms, 
transport allowance, status of civil works, 
teaching learning materials etc.
Technology integration has also been an integral 
part of enhancing quality of education. Various 
initiatives have been undertaken to tackle this 
challenging situation which are as follows: 
(i) PM e-Vidya (https://pmevidya.education.
gov .in): The COVID-19 pandemic presented 
a catastrophe for human civilisation but 
at the same time it became catalytic 
in bringing out various new strategies 
and accelerating the pace of technology 
intervention. PM e-vidya launched 
during the time of pandemic is one such 
comprehensive initiative which ensures 
coherent access to digital education 
through multimodal approach. The digital 
platform of MoE ‘DIKSHA’ has been declared 
as ‘One Nation, One Digital Platform’.
DIKSHA can be accessed by learners and 
teachers across the country and currently 
supports 30 Indian languages. Each State/
UT leverages this platform in its own way, 
as it has the freedom and choice to use 
the varied capabilities and solutions of 
the platform to design and run programs 
for teachers, learners and administrators. 
DIKSHA policies and tools make it 
possible for the education ecosystem 
(educationist, experts, organisations, 
institutions - government, autonomous 
institutions, non-government and private 
organisations) to participate, contribute 
and leverage a common platform to 
achieve learning goals at scale for 
the country. In the times of COVID-19 
pandemic, the platform has experienced 
unprecedented rise in access by learners 
and teachers across the country. There 
have been more than 5 billion learning 
sessions, 59 billion learning minutes, 22 
billion-page hits. DIKSHA could smoothly 
handle such traffic owing to its robust 
tech-stack, futuristic design, and dedicated 
groups of manpower.
DIKSHA currently hosts over 6,500 
textbooks energised with QR codes, 
including 359 NCERT textbooks and also 
called Energised Textbooks (ETBs). There 
are more than 3.01 lakh digital content 
on DIKSHA which include audio-visual 
content, reading and practice material, 
interactive resources and lesson plans. 
For digital content to aid in the teaching 
and learning processes, a rich repository 
of varied resources was contributed by 
Schools/individual teachers, content 
partners, NGOs, corporates under CSR 
under VidyaDaan against the various 
content requirements of NCERT/CBSE/
States/UTs. As on date, more than 40,000 
content pieces have been contributed 
under VidyaDaan. Further, NCERT has 
recently entered into an MoU with 
ISLRTC under which sign language videos 
are being developed jointly. More than 
3000 ISL videos have been recorded and 
about 600 videos have been uploaded on 
DIKSHA. For Children with Special Needs, 
2970 Indian Sign language (ISL) based 
content, Mukta Vidya Vani, an audio 
streaming podcast and Radio Vahini, with 
24x7 broadcast and talking books (in Daisy 
format) for learners with Blindness and 
Low Vision have been prepared and also 
a total of 3424 Audio Books have been 
developed. 10,000ISL dictionary words, 
have been uploaded on DIKSHA. 
At present, 12 PM eVIDYA DTH TV 
channels (One Class, One Channel from 
classes I to XII), are functioning that 
delivers class-wise contents on 24x7 basis 
are linked to DIKSHA through QR codes. A 
Podcast called Shiksha Vani of the CBSE is 
also being effectively used by learners of 
grades 9 to 12. 
Page 5


Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
Rashi Sharma
Purabi Pattanayak
As per the National Education Policy 2020, “Given the explosive pace of technological development allied with the sheer 
creativity of tech-savvy teachers and entrepreneurs including student entrepreneurs, it is certain that technology will impact 
education in multiple ways, only some of which can be foreseen at the present time. New technologies involving artificial 
intelligence, machine learning, block chains, smart boards, handheld computing devices, adaptive computer testing for 
student development, and other forms of educational software and hardware will not just change what students learn in the 
classroom but how they learn, and thus these areas and beyond will require extensive research both on the technological 
as well as educational fronts.” Therefore, the future of the educational system will be determined by the expansion and 
integration of technology which will serve the purpose of bringing efficiency in educational systems and transformative 
reforms in the academic sphere.
Technology Integration for Quality Education 
echnology is the predominant driver of 
the 21
st
 century which is affecting each 
and every sphere of human life. The 
impact of technology is such that the lines 
between the physical, digital and biological spheres 
are increasingly blurring and is rapidly changing 
the way people live, work and communicate. The 
word governance and e-governance have no longer 
a clear distinction in terms of policies, institutions, 
and implementation strategies. With the evolution 
of digital technologies, 
both administrations 
and institutions 
across the globe have 
been conclusively 
transformed structurally 
and in terms of the 
relationship between 
the Governments 
and citizens. These 
observations are also 
drawn from two decades 
of analytical research 
and the monitoring 
of trends within the 
framework of the United 
Nations E-Government 
Survey. While nearly 
every country is 
engaged in the process 
of digitalisation, not all 
have achieved the same 
level of development, 
and while institutions at 
all levels are committed 
T
to modernisation and digital transformation, 
approaches and outcomes vary greatly. The 
COVID-19 pandemic has further exposed digital 
divides between and within countries and various 
social groups. One of the key lessons learned during 
the pandemic is that the future is hybrid and not 
digital. In fact, the primary objective of technology 
is to recognie and foster human potential and 
support sustainable human development through 
digitalisation. 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 19 18
The UNESCO definition (www.unesco.org) of 
e-governance is stated as “E-governance is the public 
sector’s use of information and communication 
technologies with the aim of improving information 
and service delivery, encouraging citizen 
participation in the decision-making process and 
making government more accountable, transparent 
and effective. E-governance involves new styles of 
leadership, new ways of debating and deciding policy 
and investment, new ways of accessing education, 
new ways of listening to citizens and new ways of 
organising and delivering information and services. 
E-governance is generally considered as a wider 
concept than e-Government, since it can bring a 
change in the way citizens relate to Government eco 
system. E-governance can bring forth new concepts 
of citizenship, both in terms of citizen needs and 
responsibilities. Its objective is to engage, enable 
and empower the citizen.” The pandemic amplified 
the importance of e-government and digital 
technologies as essential tools for communication 
and collaboration between policy makers, private 
sectors and societies across the globe. E-governance 
has become the cornerstone for building effective, 
accountable, resilient and inclusive institutions at all 
levels, as called for in Sustainable Development Goal 
(SDG) 16, and for strengthening the implementation 
of Goal 17 (UN E-Government Survey, 2022).
With such revolutionary impact of technology, 
education sector could not be left untouched 
and during the COVID-19 pandemic, the pace of 
integration of technology in teaching learning 
processes has increased exponentially. During the 
pandemic, digital technology played an indispensable 
role in holding the civil society together by 
supporting the provision of basic-fundamental 
services in the field of health, education, and service 
sector. National Education Policy (NEP) 2020 gives 
utmost importance to technology and states that 
“The thrust of technological interventions will be 
for the purposes of improving teaching-learning 
and evaluation processes, supporting teacher 
professional development, enhancing educational 
access, and streamlining educational planning, 
management, and administration etc. It also 
recognises and addresses the issue of digital divide 
and elucidates that “the benefits of online/digital 
education cannot be leveraged unless the digital 
divide is eliminated through concerted efforts, such 
as the Digital India campaign and the availability of 
affordable computing devices. It is important that 
the use of technology for online and digital education 
adequately addresses concerns of equity.”
In the school education sector of India, 
technology has been used both in governance 
processes to improve the efficiency and effectiveness 
of schooling system and also for enhancing quality of 
education. Various governance related technological 
interventions have been initiated and undertaken by 
the Government which are given below: 
(i) UDISE+(https://dashboard.udiseplus.gov.
in): It is a well-known fact that timely and 
accurate data is the basis of sound and effective 
planning and decision-making. Realising the 
need of this, Ministry of Education (MoE) had 
initiated Unified District Information System for 
Education (UDISE) in 2012-13 integrating DISE 
for elementary and secondary education which 
is one of the largest Management Information 
Systems for School Education covering more 
than 1.5 million schools, 9.6 million teachers 
and 264 million children.
UDISE+ is an updated and improved version 
of UDISE. This is now online and has been 
collecting data in real-time since 2018-19. 
UDISE+ provides robust, real-time, and credible 
information for an objective evaluation of 
the system, which can be used for designing 
evidence based specific interventions for 
improvement in the school education sector.
Further, UDISE+ has a mandate of collecting 
information from all recognised and 
unrecognised schools which are imparting 
formal education from Pre-primary to XII.
UDISE+, collects information through an online 
Data Collection Form (DCF) on parameters 
ranging from students, schools, teachers, 
infrastructure, enrolments, examination results 
etc. Ever since its introduction, UDISE+ has 
acquired the status of the official database 
of the MoE and is now operational in all the 
districts of the country.
(ii) Performance Grading Index(PGI) (https://pgi.
udiseplus.gov.in): The PGI is a tool to provide 
insights on the status of school education and 
to catalyse transformational change in the 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 21 20
States/UTs on the basis of key indicators that 
drive their performance and critical areas for 
improvement.It grades all States/UTs on their 
performance across 77 indicators on school 
education and helps identify gaps thereby 
enabling all States/UTs to design appropriate 
interventions to bridge them. This was 
introduced from 2018-19. 
In addition to the State PGI, around 83 
indicators have been developed for Districtsto 
grade the performance in school education.
Combined report for the years 2018-19 & 2019-
20 can be accessed at https://pgi.udiseplus.gov.
in/#/home. 
The exercise envisages that the Index will propel 
the States/UTs towards undertaking multi-
pronged interventions that will bring about the 
much-desired optimal education outcomes. 
The purpose of this PGI therefore is to help the 
States/UTs to pinpoint the gaps and accordingly 
prioritise areas for intervention to ensure that 
the school education system is robust at every 
level. 
(iii) Online survey platform for National 
Curriculum Framework (NCF): With the arrival 
of NEP 2020, the focus of education has 
move towards learning about how to think 
critically, solve problems, how to be creative 
and multidisciplinary, and how to innovate, 
adapt, and absorb new material in changing 
fields. Pedagogy is expected to evolve to 
make education more experiential, holistic, 
integrated, inquiry-driven, discovery-oriented, 
learner-centred, flexible, andenjoyable. To 
make the above expectations a reality, a new 
NCF is being developed by the NCERT. The 
development of this framework is unique in 
many ways as it is adopting a ‘bottom-up’ 
approach in which suggestions are invited from 
all stakeholders on the basis of which new 
NCF will be developed and on 29 July 2022, a 
mobile/online survey for NCF was launched.
In addition, drawing insights from citizen-centric 
process of development of NEP 2020, this 
framework has also been made consultative. To 
ensure participation of each and every citizen 
of the country in this curriculum development 
process, a citizen-centric Digital Survey 
for National Curriculum - DiSanc has been 
launched. Under this survey, suggestions and 
feedback has been collected from the public at 
large for the formulation of the NCFs.
(iv) NDEAR (National Digital Education 
Architecture) (https://www.ndear.gov.in) and 
Vidya Samiksha Kendra: 
NDEAR has been launched with a larger vision to 
create a unifying national digital infrastructure 
to energise and catalyse the education 
ecosystem. NDEAR has been conceived as 
a unifying National Digital infrastructure to 
energise and catalyse the education ecosystem. 
The core idea of NDEAR is to facilitate achieving 
the goals laid down by NEP 2020, through a 
digital infrastructure for innovations in the 
education ecosystem, ensuring autonomy and 
participation of all the relevant stakeholders. 
NDEAR will enable a common set of principles 
and approaches to be followed in building, 
using, and re-using technology for education. 
Further, Vidya Samiksha Kendra (VSK) has 
been set-up at national level at NCERT and is 
aimed at leveraging data and technology to 
bring a big leap in learning outcomes. VSK will 
include Student, Teacher and School registry 
which will bring synergy to the work being 
done in the ecosystem by integrating data from 
different datasets and empowers students, 
teachers, and parents to bridge the gap. This 
will cover the entire data of school eco-system 
and will analyse by using big data analysis, 
artificial intelligence and machine learning in 
order to enhance the overall monitoring of 
the education system and thereby improving 
learning outcomes. All States and UTs have 
been provided financial support under Samagra 
Shiksha scheme for setting up VSKs. 
(v) PRABANDH (http://samagrashiksha.in): 
Department of School Education and Literacy 
had launched PRABANDH - Project Appraisal, 
Budgeting Achievements and Data Handling 
System in 2020. This System has been developed 
under Samagra Shiksha as a significant step 
towards leveraging technology to enhance 
efficiency and manage the implementation of 
the Centrally Sponsored Integrated Scheme 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 21 20
for School Education. PRABANDH System can 
be accessed at www.samagrashiksha.in. It has 
more than 10 lakh activated users and can be 
accessed from the School, Block, District and 
State Level. 
A data visualisation dashboard has been 
created in the PRABANDH System for display 
of monthly status of physical and financial 
progress under the major interventions of 
Samagra Shiksha such as text books, uniforms, 
transport allowance, status of civil works, 
teaching learning materials etc.
Technology integration has also been an integral 
part of enhancing quality of education. Various 
initiatives have been undertaken to tackle this 
challenging situation which are as follows: 
(i) PM e-Vidya (https://pmevidya.education.
gov .in): The COVID-19 pandemic presented 
a catastrophe for human civilisation but 
at the same time it became catalytic 
in bringing out various new strategies 
and accelerating the pace of technology 
intervention. PM e-vidya launched 
during the time of pandemic is one such 
comprehensive initiative which ensures 
coherent access to digital education 
through multimodal approach. The digital 
platform of MoE ‘DIKSHA’ has been declared 
as ‘One Nation, One Digital Platform’.
DIKSHA can be accessed by learners and 
teachers across the country and currently 
supports 30 Indian languages. Each State/
UT leverages this platform in its own way, 
as it has the freedom and choice to use 
the varied capabilities and solutions of 
the platform to design and run programs 
for teachers, learners and administrators. 
DIKSHA policies and tools make it 
possible for the education ecosystem 
(educationist, experts, organisations, 
institutions - government, autonomous 
institutions, non-government and private 
organisations) to participate, contribute 
and leverage a common platform to 
achieve learning goals at scale for 
the country. In the times of COVID-19 
pandemic, the platform has experienced 
unprecedented rise in access by learners 
and teachers across the country. There 
have been more than 5 billion learning 
sessions, 59 billion learning minutes, 22 
billion-page hits. DIKSHA could smoothly 
handle such traffic owing to its robust 
tech-stack, futuristic design, and dedicated 
groups of manpower.
DIKSHA currently hosts over 6,500 
textbooks energised with QR codes, 
including 359 NCERT textbooks and also 
called Energised Textbooks (ETBs). There 
are more than 3.01 lakh digital content 
on DIKSHA which include audio-visual 
content, reading and practice material, 
interactive resources and lesson plans. 
For digital content to aid in the teaching 
and learning processes, a rich repository 
of varied resources was contributed by 
Schools/individual teachers, content 
partners, NGOs, corporates under CSR 
under VidyaDaan against the various 
content requirements of NCERT/CBSE/
States/UTs. As on date, more than 40,000 
content pieces have been contributed 
under VidyaDaan. Further, NCERT has 
recently entered into an MoU with 
ISLRTC under which sign language videos 
are being developed jointly. More than 
3000 ISL videos have been recorded and 
about 600 videos have been uploaded on 
DIKSHA. For Children with Special Needs, 
2970 Indian Sign language (ISL) based 
content, Mukta Vidya Vani, an audio 
streaming podcast and Radio Vahini, with 
24x7 broadcast and talking books (in Daisy 
format) for learners with Blindness and 
Low Vision have been prepared and also 
a total of 3424 Audio Books have been 
developed. 10,000ISL dictionary words, 
have been uploaded on DIKSHA. 
At present, 12 PM eVIDYA DTH TV 
channels (One Class, One Channel from 
classes I to XII), are functioning that 
delivers class-wise contents on 24x7 basis 
are linked to DIKSHA through QR codes. A 
Podcast called Shiksha Vani of the CBSE is 
also being effectively used by learners of 
grades 9 to 12. 
Kurukshetra       December  2022 Kurukshetra       December  2022 23 22
(ii) Capacity Building of Teachers through 
NISHTHA online (https://itpd.ncert.gov.
in): The NEP 2020 clearly focuses on 
empowering teachers by spelling out 
the role at different levels of expertise/
stage and competencies required. The 
policy has stated that each teacher will be 
expected to participate in at least 50 hours 
of Continuous Professional Development 
(CPD) program every year for their own 
professional development, driven by their 
own interests. CPD will systematically 
cover the latest pedagogies regarding 
foundational literacy and numeracy, 
assessment, competency-based learning, 
experiential learning, arts-integrated, 
sports-integrated, and storytelling-based 
approaches, etc. National Initiative for 
School Heads’ and Teachers’ Holistic 
Advancement (NISHTHA), an integrated 
training programme was initiated covering 
all the recommended areas and aims at 
holistic development of teachers. Under 
NISHTHA face-to- face training during 
2019-20, 23,137 SRGs and 17,74,728 
teachers and head teachers working in 
schools run by States/UTs were covered 
from 33 States/UTs.During the pandemic, 
NISHTHA was launched online at DIKSHA 
to ensure Under NISHTHA 1.0, about 24 
lakh school teachers and head teachers at 
elementary education level (Classes 1-8) 
across 34 States/UTs and 8 Autonomous 
Bodies under MoE, Ministry of Defense 
(MoD) and Ministry of Tribal Affairs 
(MoTA) had completed training and 
were certified. Subsequently, NISHTHA 
2.0 for Secondary teachers, NISHTHA 
3.0 for Foundational stage teachers, and 
NISHTHA 4.0 for training of master trainers 
of ECCE have been launched for building 
capacities of teachers at all levels. Around 
7.5 lakh secondary teachers and 12 lakh 
pre-primary and primary teachers have 
completed NISHTHA 2.0 and NISHTHA 3.0 
training respectively. 
Realising the need of digital education during 
COVID-19, the Government decided that the 
impetus for the education for 2022-23 would 
be on digital mode of learning to reverse the 
learning loss caused by the academic disruption 
due to the COVID pandemic situation. The 
following initiatives have been announced in 
Budget 2022-23 to expand the scale and scope 
of digital technology and to ensure learning for 
all, with equity, to cover all students at all levels 
of education, keeping in view India’s scale, 
diversity, complexity and device penetration. 
(i) 200 TV Channels: Due to learning 
gaps caused by the pandemic-induced 
closure of schools, the need to impart 
supplementary teaching and to build 
a resilient mechanism for education 
delivery. For this purpose, the ‘one class-
one TV channel’ program of PM e-VIDYA 
will be expanded from 12 to 200 TV 
channels. This will enable all states to 
provide supplementary education in 
regional languages for classes 1-12. 
(ii) Virtual Labs: NEP 2020 recommends 
creating virtual laboratories so that all 
students have equal access to quality 
practical, critical thinking and hands-
on experience for teaching-learning of 
Science, Mathematics and Vocational 
Skills. To support this around 750 virtual 
labs in science and mathematics, and 75 
skilling e-labs for the simulated learning 
environment, will be set up in 2022-23. 
(iii) High Quality E-Content: High-Quality 
e-content in all spoken languages will be 
developed for delivery via internet, mobile 
phones, TV, and radio through Digital 
Teachers.
(iv) Competitive Mechanism For E-Content: 
A competitive mechanism for the 
development of quality e-content by the 
teachers will be set up to empower and 
equip them with digital tools of teaching 
and facilitate better learning outcomes.
Conclusion
The NEP 2020 calls for investment in digital 
infrastructure, online teaching platforms and tools, 
virtual labs, digital repositories, online assessments, 
technology and pedagogy for online teaching-