NIOS to provide certificate of class X and XII to Sanskrit students

New Delhi: An autonomous organisation under the ministry of Union Human Resource and Development (MHRD) -- National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) -- has decided to provide platform for Sanskrit learners whose traditional learning did not get certification. Now this will set the ball rolling to open opportunities for these students.

Actually such students who have gone to study at 'gurukuls' and 'vedic pathshalas' have been facing many hurdles like this but now very soon they will be eligible for Class X and Class XII certificates from NIOS. This will make them eligible to apply for jobs that have a basic requisite of Class 12 qualification.

Any student who is 15 years of age and self-certifies that he can read and write Sanskrit is eligible to apply for Class X certification with the NIOS. The student will be assigned a 'gurukul' nearby to be able to attend classes. The NIOS has also prepared Sanskrit textbooks for them.

The 'gurukuls' chosen under this schema are ones that have Sanskrit teachers, classrooms and other basic infrastructure. The scheme is part of an initiative to promote "Indian Knowledge Tradition" courses. The ministry has been planning for such initiative from long and now it has started implementing it.

Sources in the ministry on condition anonymity said, "Our scheme is National Curriculum Framework-compliant, and the scheme has already begun with a small batch of students. The students will have to pass five subjects that include Veda Adhyayana (Vedic learning), Bharatiya Darshan (Indian Philosophy), Sanskrit Vyakarana (Sanskrit Grammar), Sanskrit Sahitya (Sanskrit Literature) and Sanskrit Bhasha (Sanskrit Language)." "If students gets passing mark that is 33 per cent in the exams conducted by the NIOS, then they will be eligible for the certificate," said the official.

The NIOS had also put up a stall of its Sanskrit material at the recent Sanskrit Conclave at Ujjain, which saw the participation of the Madhya Pradesh government and the Bharatiya Shikshan Mandal, an organisation that aims to promote indigenous education. The present initiative permits Sanskrit learners to qualify as school pass-outs in open and distance learning mode.