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Every issue that our society faces is like a link of a chain. Each issue is connected to another, either directly or indirectly. The chain of issues in this society that we live in, the strongest link of that chain is illiteracy. Illiteracy is the mother of all issues as it gives birth to many other issues like poverty, unemployment, child labour, female foeticide, population burst and many more.

It is very hard to digest that the land of the Vedas is one of the countries with the highest illiteracy levels and shows the inability of our government to utilize programs like Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and National Literacy Mission. Even countries like Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Vietnam, Thailand and the like have achieved, in lesser time, a much better percentage of literacy. Literacy is a reasonably good indicator of development in a society.

Spread and diffusion of literacy is generally associated with essential trait of today’s civilization such as modernization, urbanization, industrialization, communication and commerce. This fact can be clarified as all the developed countries like America and Canada have very low illiteracy rates, whereas countries like India, Turkey and Iran have a very high rate of illiteracy. World Bank studies have established the direct and functional relationship between literacy and productivity on the one hand and literacy and the overall quality of human life on the other.

A person aged seven and above, who can both read and write with any understanding in any language, is treated as literate. As per 2001 Census, the overall literacy rate of India is 65.38%. The difference between the highest and the lowest literacy rate in India is very high. Kerala has the highest literacy rate which is 90.92 %, while Bihar has the lowest with 47.53 %.

Illiteracy in India is characterized by wide gaps between the urban and rural populations. The rural population depends mainly on agriculture and the rate of illiteracy is high, while the urban population is more of the ‘employee class’ and also more educated. Even amongst the male and female population, there is a wide disparity in literacy. The male literacy rate is 75.96% and female literacy rate is 54.28%. The social system in India promotes education for the male gender while the female population, especially in the deep interiors of the country, is kept away from schools.