Living in the margins: Why Kerala’s fisherfolk lag behind in higher education

Neither the occupation of fishing nor the community of fisherfolk find any mention in the curricula taught in schools. This omission is striking, given that farming is extensively covered in our textbooks.
A Kerala beach
A Kerala beach
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“I come from a society where the number of people who go on to do graduation in any subject is low,” wrote Ibin Nayakam, a first generation graduate from the coastal community of Poovar in Kerala’s Thiruvananthapuram. Ibin was discussing how various circumstances push marginalised persons like himself into low-paying physical jobs in his article How Ravish Kumars become popular while indigenous journalists are left behindpublished in Round Table India. He wrote about how higher education is hardly accessible or affordable for Kerala’s fishing community and how marginalised communities everywhere continue to be deprived of basic rights. “[The oppressors] want us to waste our calibre by always worrying about survival until the next day, by creating problems for us and perpetrating injustices in our lives,” wrote Ibin, who has a postgraduate degree in Journalism from the University of Jammu.

Ibin’s words reveal how the state’s fishing community is yet to fully benefit from the benchmarks set by Kerala in literacy and living standards. The paper “Changing Profile of Poverty among Kerala's Marine Fishing Communities: Are They Still Outliers?” (2020) noted, “A decade ago, an analysis was made of the process whereby the fisherfolk in Kerala (particularly the marine communities) were left out from the much-acclaimed benefits of Kerala's 'high quality of life' development experience. In terms of income, land holdings, housing quality, health conditions, and literacy levels, the fishing community were clearly 'outliers'. They stood far behind the all-Kerala averages.” Authored by John Kurien of Azim Premji University in Bengaluru, the paper stated that the tempo of socio-economic change in the fishing communities of the state was maintained only for two decades between 1956 and 1975. The community has since been withheld from attaining growth at par with the rest of the state.

TNM spoke to fisherfolk on the issue, who cited several reasons for their educational backwardness, despite living in urban areas in close proximity to communities with better exposure. They include financial compulsions of families, the lack of an environment conducive for studies, and absence of a system that encourages them to pursue it further. Their educational backwardness is also linked to the backwardness of the community in general, whose main occupation remains fishing.

A curriculum that never reflects fisherfolk

Official data by Kerala’s Fisheries Department states that around eight lakh people earn their livelihood from fishing and allied activities. Kerala has a coastline of 589.5 km, with 222 fishing villages situated along the coastline of the state. The total population of fisherfolk in Kerala is 10 lakh, of which marine fisherfolk make up seven lakh. The Christians among the fisherfolk mostly belong to the Latin Catholic rite. Arayans, Velans, Mukkuvas, and Marakkans constitute the Hindu fisherfolk, while Muslim fisherfolk are comparatively less in number. Members of all religions in the community fall under Other Backward Classes. However, neither the occupation nor the community find any mention in the curricula taught in schools. This omission is striking, given that farming is extensively covered in our textbooks.

When asked about this absence, Sindhu Maria Napoleon, a member of the fishing community in Thiruvananthapuram’s Vizhinjam, said, “I don't have an answer if asked whether a curriculum can be inclusive of the scores of communities of a state. But there are certain areas in which the community could be included. For example, environmental protection has always been linked to forest in the curriculum, never with the sea.” Born and raised in the fishing community, Sindhu holds a postgraduate degree from the University of Hyderabad and is an independent researcher and journalist. “In the last four years, we, the members of Coastal Students Cultural Forum (CSCF), included sea conservation as part of World Environment Day celebrations in the schools in coastal regions and also suggested Ocean Day too be observed. But there have been no such attempts from the government or academia,” she said, explaining the efforts to make school curricula inclusive.

Sindhu Maria Napoleon

Johnson Jament, who has a PhD in Education, echoed Sindhu’s view that the community is not reflected in any form in the curricula. A member of the coastal community in Thiruvananthapuram, Johnson said, “Fisherfolk live very near to urban areas. As an educationist and academic, I have observed that we don’t exist in curricula, and are nothing in pedagogy. We won’t reach anywhere in an education system that has a perspective that we, the fishing community, is born to fail. Teachers would even tell students that they would become fishermen just like their fathers.” He is a visiting research fellow at the School of Global Studies and faculty of Anthropology University of Sussex, United Kingdom.

Johnson’s analysis of the current curriculum documentation used in the coastal regions of Kerala revealed that there was limited understanding of the history, culture, and traditions which are significant to the local communities. He studied curriculum documentation as a means of identifying contents and pedagogical approaches that exclude the opportunity for children to engage with their immediate living contexts and the history of their people. He explained how being denied a mention in curricula causes low self-concept in the younger generation. Johnson said, “Which textbook carries a mention of the coastal community? There is no representation of the environment we represent in curricula—the natural, productive, and dynamic environment. The education system teaches us about farming, but not about fishing, which would indirectly tell us that I am not worthy, so are my people.” Sindhu added to this, saying, “There are certain things that should be treated differently as the students from the fishing community speak a different language (dialect, diction), come from a different environment, and their life depends on a particular occupation. The curriculum has no real life situations that fisherfolk can relate to.” 

The need for a support system within the community

Ibin believes that illiteracy of parents is one of the reasons why the younger generation is not attracted to studies. Ibin’s father is a fisherman, and both his parents are uneducated. However, he benefited from the mentoring system in schools in coastal areas, where students are mentored by teachers. “Children receive no mentoring or guidance at homes as parents are not educated. The only support they can provide is financial. I was able to continue studying because I was guided by a teacher. But my siblings did not get any particular support and that extra push was not there. I was part of the National Service Scheme (NSS) during Plus Two, which helped in my grooming,” he said. But Johnson, who like the other educated people in the community had to fight all odds to complete his PhD from the University of Northampton, said that the teachers would mentor only those who are talented and wouldn’t make an extra effort to lend a hand to everyone alike.

Ibin Naykam

Not only at home, but even in the community at large, there is a lack of proper guidance for students. In Ibin’s view, support groups within the community are also important. “The support comes from groups (like the CSCF) formed by educated people within the community. This is done with a sense of social commitment from them. Libraries too have been set up for the purpose. Without support from such groups, hardly any student from the community will opt for higher studies,” he said.

The Church has set up coaching facilities to crack competitive examinations like the Public Service Commission (PSC) and civil service examinations. However, Sindhu said, such initiatives only benefit those who have been able to successfully complete school or graduation. “At one time, there was huge investment in PSC coaching, as though the problems of the community would be solved if some of us got government jobs. Later, the focus was on civil service examinations. Here again, the problem was that such efforts did not focus on school dropouts. One needs to have some basic qualification to get a government job or become a civil servant,” Sindhu pointed out.

“Students have no role models from within the community. There are many who are educated but unemployed in the community. What they see are school dropouts earning the same salary as postgraduates employed in the state,” said Kumar Sahayaraju who hails from coastal Thiruvananthapuram. Kumar did his Masters in the United Kingdom and is now pursuing PhD in Bangalore. "People my age (those not well-educated or professionally qualified) have financially settled by doing whatever jobs they could find. It is tough for us to stay unemployed and continue studies as the financial compulsions of the families are huge. I have been able to convince my parents to let me stick to education. But it is not easy for everyone to convince their families that immediate changes won't come with education. There is no atmosphere (at home or in the community) to set a goal for the future,” he added.

Boys have to earn from a young age

Kumar explained how children are often forced to carry the financial burdens of their families. “Most families have two daughters and a son; or a daughter and a son. Daughters are married off at a young age, with the son having to take care of the wedding expenses. This means that both boys and girls stop their studies mostly after Plus Two,” he said. Kumar used to work between his studies to meet the financial requirements of his family.

Men in the community start working at a young age. Most boys join their fathers in fishing. Johnson, Sindhu, and Ibin shared similar thoughts on this. “Boys drop out because many of them work with their fathers during school vacation or during seasons of good catch. The money they get lures them to fishing, as immediate financial needs are met. In due course, this will make them discontinue studies,” Ibin said. “Earning from a young age makes them confident, gradually distancing them from studies. The money would seem big at that age. But the pay from fishing would still be Rs 2,000 or Rs 3,000 even after years. There is a limit for the money that fishing can provide,” he added. 

Low number of institutions forces students to discontinue

The fishing community has by now recognised the need for basic education and instances of children not getting primary education are rare. In Sindhu’s opinion, “I won't say there is 100% school education in the community. There are students who drop out in high school or in Plus One. I have classmates who dropped out in class 4 and class 7. When I met them later in life, they had become fishermen. Some of them had gone to the Gulf countries. The ones that dropped out were mostly those categorised by teachers as students who couldn’t understand a thing. Some of them work as fishermen even now, indicating that they have excelled in the work.”

Joy Sebastian, an entrepreneur and the son of a fisherman from Cherthala in Alappuzha district, said that the schooling they receive doesn’t equip them to compete with students from privileged backgrounds. “The schools in the fishing villages, whether aided or government-run, are not up to the mark and fail to produce students who can compete with the rest. Some of them may excel in school, but once they step out, they are made to compete with students who have got better exposure,” he said. Joy added that the reason for many discontinuing studies after Plus Two can be attributed to the lack of educational institutions in proportion to the population. “For example, there is only one college under the Alappuzha diocese. In that, students from other communities too should be admitted as per the norms and hence, the number of students that can be admitted from the community is low,” he said.

A 2022 study conducted by the Kerala Region Latin Catholic Council (KRLCC) highlighted the case of insufficient number of higher education institutions in coastal regions. It compared data on education among the fishing community in Alappuzha with that from across the state. The report of the study has not been published yet. It is to be noted that the Latin Catholic Church has built fewer educational institutions when compared to other churches in the state that have more resources. “Coastal Alappuzha has only two government high schools, no government-aided schools, and no higher secondary school attached to the high schools. There is a distance of 40 km between the two government high schools,” a source who was part of the study told TNM. “In the last 10 years, there was 100% pass for Pallithode High School in Alappuzha in class 10. Yet, there is no higher secondary school (neither government nor government-aided) in the vicinity to accommodate these students for higher secondary education. Not all students can go to places like Chengannur (which is two hours away) for higher studies.This is the case in most regions,” the source informed. Similarly, in coastal Ernakulam, there is only one government higher secondary school on the 21 km from Arthunkal to Chellanam.

The pass percentage of students in Plus Two and class 10 in Kerala is generally high. But the number of seats in the higher secondary or the higher education level are limited. “The situation is such that even those students who secure A-plus in all subjects have to worry about getting college admission. There are quotas for the Latin Catholics in two colleges (St Xavier’s, Thumba, and All Saints) in Thiruvananthapuram, which is reflective of the general picture in the state. Even if a student scores 85%, they may not get college admissions for reasons like insufficient seats or a missed allotment date. Students from the community have to compete with those coming from privileged backgrounds, with highly-qualified parents, and personal contacts at universities and colleges. They will have better access to information, WiFi connections at homes, and will have been groomed to become professionals from a young age. At the same time, students from the fishing community would get to know about many professional courses or other opportunities only if they ever get a chance to graduate,” Sindhu said. 

“In a region in Alappuzha with 534 fisher families, there was no lawyer, doctor, surveyor, or health inspector,” the source associated with the KRLCC study said. They attributed this to the low number of professional colleges that are sufficiently close by for  day scholars. “In the coastal regions of Alappuzha, there is only one Arts and Science college for men, which does not offer many courses and students do not get their preferred courses, forcing many to discontinue studies after Plus Two. The only other institution is an Industrial Training Institute (ITI) in Arthunkal, which is 21 km from Alappuzha and 40 kilometres from Kochi. It is the only ITI in an 81-km stretch of the coastline. No institutions offering paramedical courses are there. The only engineering college is 35 km away in Ambalapuzha. Even if the students manage to get admission, they tend to struggle in studies due to their disadvantageous background. Many tend to drop out. The educated and employed people of the community generally have a tendency to live away from the coast, hence failing to become role models for the community,” the source further added. It is said that the KRLCC has decided to focus on education, to make teachers from the community work for children among them, and to set aside a share of Church income for education. 

Kumar Sahayaraju

A majority of the students who studied fisheries science at the higher secondary level do not go to college. According to Kumar, marine-related courses are few in the country in general. Kerala offers very few college courses for those who studied Fisheries Science in vocational higher secondary schools. Those available are Bachelors in Fisheries Science and a few diploma courses at the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (KUFOS) in Kochi, which offers only a limited number of seats. The admission process involves an entrance examination, which requires students from the fishing community to compete with others. In Kumar’s opinion, a criteria that is inclusive of students from the community should be devised in the KUFOS admission process. 

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