In terms of literacy, India lags behind many other developing countries. Let us briefly look at scenario of literacy, which faces a number of challenges, in India.

It was aimed to universalize elementary education, but unfortunately nothing much has happened, and there is no convergence of the plethora of schemes in the primary school sector. The framework and design for the SSA leaves little to be desired. But the government officials working in this sector admit that it does not take into account the human factor. The many interventions in the elementary in the elementary education sector since National Policy on education was announced in 1996, be it Operation Blackboard, teacher Education,Non-Formal Education, Mahila Samakhya, have in some measure made a difference. But it is yet unclear how the convergence will improve the delivery system or quality. For in its evaluation of the various schemes, the government has discovered the following issues: While Operation Blackboard had resulted in more teachers, rooms, and teaching/learning facilities, utilization of equipment and community involvement in the implementation process left a lot to be desired; under the Teacher education scheme, the expansion of the District Institutes of education and Training has failed to provide academic leadership at the district level; the nutritional support scheme is fraught with administrative problems of delivery as well as its effectiveness for enrolment of children; and while the DPEP districts indicated that decentralized planning contributed towards a more meaningful community involvement with improvement in enrolment, achievements in the learning process and the quest for universal primary education is still modest.