“AN ANALYSIS OF THE BASIC EDUCATION POLICY OF THE TIBETANS IN EXILE” POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

   

In March 1959, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama fled to India after China occupied Tibet. 

In India, the Dalai Lama saw the importance of providing education to young children in 

exile community to nurture them as future seeds of Tibet. The Dalai Lama requested 

Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru to consider Tibetans to have separate schools which impart 

not only modern education but also preserve Tibetan culture and identity.     

   

The first Tibetan school was set up in the year 1960 in Mussoorie (Central School for 

Tibetans, Mussoorie). Liberal education policy is designed as a lifelong process to maximize

the capability and self-fulfillment of individuals, thereby maximizing their full potential, 

and enriching their lives, together with that of the community of which each is a part. 

Primarily libertarians believe in individual rights. The Tibetan establishment of school 

and its education Policy is not within the state of Tibet. People were very much focus

on strengthen the right of Individual since after the invasion of Tibet by China. But

they didn’t believe that it is not the government role to educate the youth and they 

want government to help from the sphere of education. They believe that the government 

interference in education will in turn effect the education choice of students in good way.

Therefore, they believe that the government should carry its operations and activities from

the elementary school level to the college level education. In this perspective it will go

against the view of the libertarian on public education.   

  

Yet if we look toward the socialist education Policy of Tibetan in exile, we can easily figure

out that the development of education aims to benefit all equally with equal opportunity. 

All level of education in the school system are free of cost and all of them are covered 

by the fund of central government and the regional budget. Primary education is giving 

a special priority so as to eliminate the illiteracy among the masses. It has specially 

established Tibetan school in most of Tibetan settlement in India, so that the student 

can groom within the boundary of its own culture. Not only that, the main goal of setting 

up an educational system was to serve twin purpose of imparting Tibetan students with 

modern education and the preservation of the rich Tibetan language and culture. There

have been many discussions within the Tibetan exile community and its leadership which 

eventually led to the formulation of the Basic Education Policy. Since all the Tibetans 

were mark with humiliation on the pride of state, the imposition of education isn’t base 

on which best serves the interest of state but rather it is to make individual free in thinking

process. Only education is medium which can liberal the right to think. Which is again

unlike to the Socialist education system.   

   

The Basic Education Policy has been formulated based on the need for a policy directed

towards an objective that envisions the creation of a well-organized society which is

educated both in mind as well as heart. The BEP of Tibetans in exile was formulated

and passed in the Parliament of Central Tibetan Administration in 2004. The shaping up 

of the policy has been influenced by some of the philosophies of Mahatma Gandhi’s

Ahimsa (non-violence), Sri Aurobindo, J.Krishnamurti and Rabindranath Tagore.

The policy also provides a good and strict guideline to run schools. Many analysts have

pointed out that Gandhi was in the anarchist tradition and that his anarchism was strongly

individualistic that lead to the libertarian. But I cannot come to conclusion that Tibetan

education policy is mainly base on libertarian, the expert had also referred to 

Sri Aurobindo, J.Krishnamurti, his writings contain no residues of the same and neither 

positive nor negative references to the system. A critical interpretation of 

Krishnamurti's philosophy reveals that he is neither located in the Indian scene 

nor founded on any classical western philosophy. Along with that the expert also 

seek the wisdom on education from the Rabindranath Tagore, who firmly believe

on socialism. So, the question that arise in this dilemma is that since Tibetan

are firm believer of Buddhism and Buddhism theology have similarity in libertarian.

So, does the BEP education system firmly believe on Libertarian too?    

The BEP sees four major stakeholders’ i.e., teachers, students, parents and 

administration (Central Tibetan Administration) that can affect the outcome of policy

objectives. The aims and objectives of education according to the BEP are freedom 

of thought, altruism, upholding heritage and innovation. Thus, the policy has a 

universal approach that goes against the view of the capitalists and the socialists. The 

success of the policy can be assessed based on the proper implementation at the ground 

level. The one of the most successful exile government formulated policy the world

has ever witness!    

In some interview of His Holiness Dalai lama mention that he is a Marxist, to have 

capitalist in society is actually helping the unprivileged people, especially the Marxist 

and he also mention that “Any system is applicable if it truly benefits people” so 

in term of social economic theory, His Holiness Dalai lama want to happily 

agree. Which ultimately impact on education policy of Tibetan. He is a charismatic

leader and his decision influence the life of Tibetans. The implication here is that in

Marxism there is no state and every property is not own by Individuals. So here, I 

have a different take in according to the establishment of education policy. 

  

   

Like any other schools of thought the purpose of Libertarian education is designed to

make a self- aware educated person who is able to take an intentional purposeful

action in the world. I believe in an education system where there is a space for the 

individual students to decide what school is best for their academic field and had 

enough freedom to make a decision for themselves i.e., what is good to them. So,

government intervention in academic field can impose something which benefits

the state and not the individual. Because of which I like libertarian view of no-

intervention from the state in academic choice while giving some educational financial support 

of voucher system at the same time. Unfortunately, I am also very unhappy to share 

that the community that I grow up, by so far was not strong enough to introduce 

private institution for education in the community. The number of people in exile is

just a palm of a hand. The rich resources are not accessible to its own people. So

those constraint led to the certain stand on political philosophy and the libertarian 

education wasn’t the choice of Tibetan.    

   

My preference of Education policy: libertarian and liberal.

     

My preferred of Education policy will framed in such a way that the education 

system of principles is innovation. I am not arguing that there isn’t a principle of

innovation in the BEP of the Central Tibetan Administration. But the primary

focus would be the innovation and creativity only. The school and education policy 

will firmly stick-on innovation within the boundary of human value and its rich culture.

A person who can make use of resources given to him and also leave behind resources

for future use, a person who can be innovative as to make changes to adapt to new

changes. Libertarians believe that education is like an economy which can be best 

achieved by separating itself from the government interference and left it open in 

the free market. It can achieve greater height of quality education in terms of 

effectiveness, efficiency, transparent, accountability and diversity of choice etc. 

Therefore, not preferring governments’ role of interference in education and instead

to focus on giving more freedom to the parents in deciding what kind of education 

their Children needs. As, it believes that the parents of children best know what 

kind of education their children need. Accordingly, they will educate the child 

either through technology or home tutorial and they are the best medium through

which the values of child will be developed. And libertarians want the parents to

be responsible for the funding of their children’s education. This philosophy views 

firmly suit the believe of modern and young parent of Tibetan. Parent have a huge

role in educating and choice of education. The Importance was felt thirty years

back from now by the older generation.     

 

 

Let take the case of Central University for Tibetan studies in Sarnath and the 

Tibetan Astrological and Medical institutes in India that provide university 

education with Tibetan language as the medium of instructions. Students who 

wish to pursue graduate education in the field of engineering and allopathic 

medicine will lose their prospect of securing a good medical college or an 

engineering college as their understanding of the subject is through 

Tibetan and the language of instructions is in English so they will have difficulty

in cracking the entrance exams and then during the course of study, they will 

take time to adapt. So, establishing a private school will solve the problem. The

urgency needs to adopt a liberal education policy. The purpose of the Liberal 

education is designed to make a self-aware educated person who is able to take 

an intentional purposeful action in the world. Traditional thinking and culture bound 

emotion isn’t the best way to look through the problem. Liberally educated people

are little skeptical of their own traditions as they are taught and trained in such

a way that it hardly conforms to higher authorities and only accept the things 

which they find rational purposeful action. 

There is need of a strong individual

personality to carry and obtain the so-called smart power in this world. Producing

a strong Individual will create employment and gain of a power in the international

platform. After all, if we look closely in every political philosophy stand, there 

is only one leader/ a person that led the people of their own community or state. 

Moreover, the idea of equality in education has to be a dominant topic of discussion

in the education institutions. liberals didn’t consider private sectors as a barrier

in the process of imparting education to the students. Therefore, instead of eliminating

private schools out of the society, they want the government education institutions to

be upgraded up to private institution level in terms of infrastructure and efficiency 

in academic quality. Those flaw that exists in the current system is not necessarily be

the problem for life. 

The major stakeholder in this education Policy are 

Teacher, Parents and Entrepreneur. Hiring good teacher and excellent academic

pedagogy need huge amount of capital and competition among the private and 

government institution that will bring the quality product and lead to standardization. 

The huge capital investment led to increase in the prosperity of the community. 

The income generation will be much greater than before. Here the liberal education 

policy plays the major role.     

   

The education policy that has been formulated has come up due to a need among 

the people as well as considering the situation of the present world. It should be 

in consideration that the policy has to draw from various philosophies that counter 

the problem of existing policy, and adapt in high end intellectuals of the modern era. 

The education policy shouldn’t carry alone with a philosophy but rather rejoicing 

every philosophy that benefit to the people.