Study of Rural Functional Literacy Programme 1985-86

Abstract

Elimination of illiteracy has been one of the major concerns of the Government since Independence. But because of the country’s vast size, its huge population, limited resources and high drop-out rate in primary schools, appreciable increase in the level of literacy could not be achieved. According to the census data, the literacy rate of our country was 36.23 per cent in 1981 as against 16.67 per cent in 1951. However, the number of illiterates in respect of all age groups increased progressively from 300 million in 1951 to 437 million in 1981.