Position Paper

Committee: United Nations International Children’s Emergency

Fund (UNICEF)
Country: Republic of India
Topic: Challenges Towards Virtual Education

“Our mission has been to ensure that learning will never be interrupted, no matter
what,” Rashima V Varma
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, education was seen in a crisis; but now, the pandemic has created
the largest disruption of education systems in history, affecting nearly 1.6 billion learners in more than
190 countries and all continents. (UN, 2020) On the other hand, taking into account that in rural areas,
children had to walk an average of 18.5 kilometers to get to school, probably the virtual education method
because of social distancing, could be an advantage, especially for them. However, in 71 countries around
the world, less than half of the population has access to the internet and in most African countries, less
than a quarter of the population has internet access. (UNICEF, 2020) And like all other countries in the
world, the Republic of India is no stranger to it and it’s fully aware of the seriousness of the matter.
The figure of the affected learners by the pandemic in India, is 320 million out of 1.6 billion worldwide.
India has a population of 1.3 billion of people, of which 67% lives in rural areas, but in this case, internet
access to receive virtual classes is not the biggest problem, since for the first time, according to the
IAMAI, India has 10% more internet users in rural zones than in the urban India and obviously that is
not the problem. This becomes an issue when only 21.3% of students have access to computers and it also
exists a large number of digital illiteracy. In view of this and the many other challenges facing the Indian
education system, the National Education Policy 2020, was created and which is the first education policy
of the 21st century. In this, more current aspects are mentioned, such as Online and Digital Education:
Ensuring Equitable Use of Technology, which represents a very useful part during the pandemic.
Moreover, India’s government has bought cheap British tablets to introduce them to their schools and
universities and benefit around 220 million children who couldn´t have online classes and those who live
in rural areas.
Totally concerned about the delicate situation, the Republic of India suggests the following proposals.
First, the “ABCDEF” plan, which consists of: 1) Identifying available resources with open licensing and
tools for virtual learning; 2) Aligning this resources to national curricula; 3) Building digital literacy
among students, parents and teachers; 4) Assisting educators with instructional design; 5) Investing in
digital infrastructure; 6)