UNESCO'S ASSISTANCE ACTIVITIES IN INDIA

UNESCO is an intergovernmental organization. Whatever its Secretariat in Paris does, it does at the behest of government representatives at the General Conference or at sessions of the Executive Board. The record of UNESCO's attainments and drawbacks, therefore, must be seen primarily as the record of governments to implement, nationally and regionally, plans and projects that they have themselves prioritised. It is only against this background that UNESCO's activities in the past half century can be measured. 

Broadly speaking, the nature of activities is two-fold: for the public at large, they represent the monumental, visible, high-profile work done by the Organization against the backdrop of history: the project for the comprehensive study of the Silk Roads, for instance, or the international campaigns launched. for the safeguarding of the world's priceless treasures: Mohenjodaro in Pakistan, the Cultural Triangle in Sri Lanka, the Valley of Kathmandu in Nepal, the city of Bagerhat in Bangladesh, the temple of Borobodur in Indonesia., or, further afield, the safeguarding of Venice in Italy and the Acropolis in Greece and -- the most famous of them all -- the rescuing of the temples of Abu Simbel in Egypt from the rising waters of the Nile following the construction of the Aswan Dam. 

However, not too many people know that UNESCO stepped in to help young, independent countries by providing material and human resources for a host of new institutions: teacher training colleges, schools for engineers and technicians or the training of thousands of teachers. The Organization's discreet but extremely useful role in developing libraries, archives and documentation services often remains unnoticed but it has done much to broaden access to these centres. For instance, the General Information Programme is an unprecedented effort to organise library and documentation resources. Still fewer know -- outside the scientific community -- of the work done by UNESCO in launching man, international scientific programmes in geology, hydrology, oceanography or the environment. These ventures have been driven by two aims: to further knowledge and its application on a worldwide scale, and to instil an awareness of the impact of scientific and technological progress oil the future of mankind. 

The UNESCO Office in India, which began. as a. science office, was established in 1948 as UNESCO's first decentralised office in Asia. Initially known as the South Asia Science Cooperation Office (1948-68), then as the Field Science Office for South Asia (1969-74) and still later as the Regional Office of Science and Technology for South and Central Asia (ROSTSCA), it is now known simply as the UNESCO New Delhi Office. It covers eleven countries of South and Central Asia including Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Iran, Maldives, Mongolia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri. Lanka.

 UNESCO's mission in its science programmes is to encourage the development of science, although the Organization itself does not undertake scientific research. Nor does it function primarily by making research grants to scientists outside the Organization, as do some development agencies (although it does give some research grants). UNESCO's role is best described as a promoter of science or as a `mover' of scientific activity. The actual initiatives that UNESCO takes may be relatively small in themselves and set in motion or managed by at most a small number of scientists, but they are -- and at any rate have the potential to be -- greatly amplified by the actions of others.

In its early years the work of the Office centred on forging links between scientists and scientific institutions in the region and those in other parts of the world. The many symposia and seminars organised by UNESCO on areas of science that were of interest to the region's member states were intended to serve as fora for bringing scientists together. This was followed by a more active role -- sometimes small, at other times more prominent in the setting up of scientific and technical institutions, scientific documentation centres, research institutions, regional networks and centres of advanced studies. Some of these activities were part of UNESCO's ongoing programmes in science, others were tied to projects and were, therefore, timebound. Most of the work done in those years fell into seven broad categories: basic sciences, applied sciences, earth sciences, marine sciences, water sciences, environmental sciences, and informatics given the presumed variety of readers of this book and also because UNESCO's activities in science and technology are so numerous, this brief overview of the Organization's New Delhi Office is based on a necessarily selective approach. It must also be borne in mind that a large part of the Organization's work - in its breadth and depth - deals with research and training, with catalysing and providing the stimulus and setting the high scientific standards necessary for developing schemes and facilities in countries that lack them.

 The field of basic sciences is a case in. point: to promote the study of chemistry, UNESCO has, for many years, taken the initiative to encourage laboratory work in colleges and university courses through support given to the fabrication, supply and maintenance of robust, simple and reliable low cost equipment for students. This programme on Locally Produced Low Cost Equipment for Chemistry teaching, based in the University of Delhi, not only led to training workshops, in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, apart from many others countries outside, the region, but also to the design, assembly, testing, maintenance and use of this equipment and to the production of manuals.

Elsewhere, UNESCO's activities in science have been less broadbased and more specialised. The variety of workshops held in the countries of the region and sponsored by UNESCO attest to this: The International Workshop on Isolation and Structure Elucidation of Natural Products in Chemistry (Karachi) for instance., or the Workshops on Electrochemistry of Semi-Conductor Electrolyte Interface and Photoelectrochemical Cells (Bombay) and Photochemical and Biological Aspects of Medicinal and other Related Plants of Sri Lanka (Peradeniya) and the National Symposium on Geomicrobiological Techniques in Biohydrometallurgical Practices (Pune). Consultancy services, travel grants, fellowships and technical assistance (in terms of expertise and equipment) are so many means by which UNESCO has backed teaching, research and institution- building while Chairs created in the fields of Energy Engineering (IIT, Delhi), Ecotechnology (M.S. Swaminathan Foundation, Madras), Science Capability (Jawaharlal Nehru Centre for Advanced Scientific Research, Bangalore) and Culture (Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi) is the Organization's way of upholding standards of excellence and enhancing research. 

All of this has been carried out in response to the needs articulated by UNESCO's member states. In science, regional science and informatics networks -- umbrella organizations enabling scientists in different disciplines to interact and debate issues of interest and urgency -- were created: the South and Central Asian Medicinal and Aromatic Plants (SCAMAP), Botany 2000 Asia, the Asian Symposium on Medicinal Plants, Spices and Other Natural Products (ASMPSONP), Asian Coordinating Group for Chemistry (ACGC) and the Regional Informatics Network for South and Central Asia (RINSCA) among others. Apart from this, the New Delhi Office has all along worked closely with the Asian Physics Education Network (ASPEN), the Conference on the Application of Science and Technology to the Development of Asia (CASTASIA -- for science policy) and the Committee on Science and Technology in Developing Countries (COSTED). Interestingly, at an ASOMPS meeting in Manila in 1992, the 283 participating scientists from 31 countries adopted the Manila Declaration concerning the Ethical Utilisation of Asian Biological Resources.

Several premier institutions in India received UNESCO's technical help in the initial stages of their development. These range from schools of planning and architecture, electronics, ocean biology, turbo machinery, combustion, power engineering, foundry and forge technology to scientific documentation, scientific instruments and arid zone research. Teacher training for engineering colleges was begun and engineering colleges at Allahabad, Bhopal, Durgapur, Jamshedpur, Mangalore, Nagpur, Rourkela, Tiruchchirapalli were started with UNESCO's technical support. The most significant example of such. cooperation was with the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, where UNESCO extended wide-ranging help in the shape of laboratory equipment, books for libraries, training facilities, experts and consultants and UNESCO fellowships. The Central Electrical Engineering Research Institute at Pilani, too, was a major beneficiary: UNESCO loaned the services of several experts for advanced techniques in semi-conductor devices, fellowships, study tours and equipment. 

Regional training courses -- the Organization's forte -- have fashioned pools of scientific talent not only in India but in the region as well. Over the years, UNESCO has collaborated regularly with the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology on a structural geology course, with the University of Roorkee on a post-graduate hydrology course, with the National Geophysical Research Institute in Hyderabad on an exploration geophysics course, with Anna University in Madras on a water resources management course and with the Central. Arid Zone Research Institute in Jodhpur on a course on the rehabilitation of degraded arid land ecosystems. In recent years, projects on mangroves and on biochemical engineering and biotechnology have been completed while another on ecotechnology is receiving substantial support. 

In the field of environment, the thrust has been on biodiversity conservation, rehabilitation and the management of natural resources. Workshops, training programmes, studies and research have been carried out in arid and semi-arid ecosystems, tropical forests and national parks. 

A highpoint of the environment programme was a one-month regional mobile training seminar held in India and Nepal three years ago for managers of protected areas. it involved an on-the-spot study of the problems and conditions of these areas and the kind of management strategies that could be adopted. Lately, funds have been generated from different donors for studies in ecosystem rehabilitation and long-term research sites in, tropical forests. 

Whereas it was only in 1991 that the mandate of the New Delhi Office was enlarged to include education, UNESCO -- through its Paris headquarters and its Bangkok Office had been working actively in this field in India for many years. As far back as 1962, a centre was established in New Delhi as part of a Regional Programme for Primary Education in Asia. This new Regional Training Centre for Education Planners, Administrators and Supervisors in Asia as it was then known, was one of four such centres set up -- the others were in Bangkok, Manila and Bandung. They were intended to provide short, in-service training courses for government officials for Asia in educational planning. In time, this institution was renamed the National Institute for Educational Planning and Administration (NIEPA). 

However, UNESCO's action in education has not been limited to training, planning, literacy, women and girls or primary education -- although this is certainly a large part of what the Organization is doing today. UNESCO understands education in its broadest and most comprehensive sense as something all-encompassing and lifelong; hence the array of extremely diverse subjects with which it has dealt: farmers' training, population education, script writing for education television, post graduate engineering education and research upgrading of audio-visual units for partially deaf children, book development for the National Institute for the Visually Handicapped, Tamil encyclopedia for children, courses for book illustrators and directors of UNESCO clubs, nutrition and health education, study on traditional technologies, training in education buildings in earthquake-prone areas to name only a few.

Technical assistance given to young institutions at the moment of their founding or at a crucial period in their development could be counted among UNESCO's early achievements in this country: the joint UNESCO-UNDP venture with die Government of India for technical assistance to the Centre for Educational Technology (which later became CIET); centres of excellence for postgraduate agriculture education and research created in 23 universities; and the development of reading rooms in North India are among the well-known examples that can be cited here. The latter, in fact, were small libraries with approximately 200 titles prepared specially for rural readers, and their establishment was followed by a large book distribution campaign. And on the subject of libraries, UNESCO was instrumental in extending library and documentation facilities to the Indian Institute of Mass Communication in 1981-83 and in setting up a mini-printing press.

Many of UNESCO's educational activities in India have been in the nature of meetings and training programmes but the Organization can claim a more `creative' legacy as well. For instance, a Children's History of India was published in 1960 to enable Associated Schools in other countries to obtain authentic literature and materials on the life and culture of India.

In 1972, a Sanskrit Conference was held in New Delhi and inaugurated by the President of India; in 1964 UNESCO supported an International Youth Festival in 1964 and in 1969-70 it helped in organising an international Gandhi Darshan Exhibition. 

From time to time, UNESCO brings out multi-media kits which, given the variety and flexibility of teaching-learning strategies they offer, are useful teaching aids. Prototype multimedia packages were prepared for environmental education under a project in 1986; so, too, was a multimedia kit of teaching in one-teacher schools. More recently simple resource packs for teachers of children with learning disabilities and those for curriculum planners of school health education to prevent AIDS and STD have been designed and field tested by UNESCO Paris and introduced in India through workshops on these subjects. 

In 1987, an important education programme -- Asia Pacific Programme of Education for All (APPEAL) -- was launched in New Delhi by the then Director-General Amadou Mahtar M'Bow with the three-fold aim of eradicating illiteracy in the Asia-Pacific states, universalising primary education and supporting continuing education. Founded on five basic principles -- the guaranteeing of education as a means of development and as a fundamental human right; recognition of the rich cultural heritage of the region; quality and relevance of education; strengthening of each country's capabilities; and special emphasis on the education of women and girls -- APPEAL also laid down the modalities of regional cooperation. 

Taking off from the 1990 World Conference on Education for All in Jomtien, Thailand, and later from the 1993 E-9 Summit in New Delhi, the New Delhi Office, jointly with the Indian authorities, launched a series of initiatives in India and South Asia to tackle EFA concerns through distance education, open schooling, learning without frontiers and through an improvement of the status of teachers. The threat that linked them was a common concern for the qualitative improvement of education, with the stress being laid firmly on education of women and girls -- now considered a priority area. 

However, the specific problems of street children were simultaneously addressed, if only in a small way, and the scope of the Organization's activities was widened to include special education, HIV/AlDS education and education for child labourers as well. 

Recently, a series of three successful workshops on Women and AIDS were conducted in Bihar, Kerala and Nepal under UNESCO sponsorship. They centred on questions such as "Why Women and AIDS", sexual behaviour, implications for women, risk reduction, awareness and self protection, the development of culturally sensitive. teaching and learning material, etc. Interestingly, such culture-specific material to get across the AIDS message was produced by the women participants themselves at each of the workshops in. the form of plays, slogans, songs and stories. The wide-ranging materials on different aspects of social, economic and family life that the meetings threw up testified to the keen interest and involvement the women showed in what, after all, affected their lives directly. 

Distance education and open learning have assumed special importance in the E-9 countries and are now seen as an alternative educational delivery system. (It may be recalled that UNESCO was involved in the training of distance educators through a pilot workshop in 1984). They focus on teacher training and non-formal education, on overcoming the barriers of remoteness, social disadvantage and inequitable resource distribution through high technology, media-based materials, school clusters and local resource persons and thereby extend learning opportunities to more People. Since 1995, and as a first step in the preparation of a management system for coordinating open schooling in India, the Office has embarked on the making of a database on distance education and open schooling for EFA in India - complete with information on programmes, courses and instructional materials ill print, audio and video forms. Thus, what began in a small way -- the education programme was, after all, the junior partner in an office dominated largely by the science programme has grown steadily from localised initiatives, papers and studies to district and block level operations.