ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how the core thrust of the NCF might impact on the likely content of future education. It argues that the emphasis on Indian tradition and the collapsing of value education with religious education puts on hold the possibility of education emerging as an enabling tool for women’s empowerment. Comparing the NCF with 19th century debates in colonial India about women’s education reveals that the new discourse is, in a substantial measure, no more than a restatement of old anxieties and equally antiquated solutions. As a counter point to these debates, the second section revisits, albeit briefly, the vision and policy framework of the New Education Policy of 1986 with regard to women’s education. Women inspire their sons to grow up in the service of the nation, much like the idealised women of the freedom struggle, the mothers of the nation’s current and future generations.
