National Education Day is celebrated across the country, every year on November 11, to commemorate the birth anniversary of India’s First Education Minister Maulana Abul Kalam Azad.
Maulana Abul Kalam Azad served the country from 1947 to 1958 as the first minister of Education in Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru's cabinet.
A reformer and the freedom fighter, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad was not merely a scholar but committed to building of the nation through education.
Maulana Abul Kalam Azad was the man behind the IITs and many key institutes in the country.
Maulana Abul Kalam Azad or Maulana Sayyid Abul Kalam Ghulam Muhiyuddin Ahmed bin Khairuddin Al-Hussaini Azad was born on November 11, 1888.
On this day, various programs and campaigns are organized to spread awareness about education and make every person literate.
Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) had decided on September 11, 2008, to celebrate November 11 as National Education Day every year.
A poet, a scholar, a journalist and a freedom fighter, he contributed to the formation of India along with many leaders. But his biggest contribution to India has been the gift of Education.
He was invited in 1920 and elected as a member of the foundation committee of Jamia Millia Islamia at Aligarh in Uttar Pradesh. In 1934 he assisted in the shifting of the campus of Jamia Millia Islamia to New Delhi.
As the first Education Minister of a free India, responsible for setting up of the Central Institute of Education in Delhi. This later came to be known as the Department of Education under the University of Delhi.
He was also responsible for setting up of University Grants Commission in 1953 and emphasized the setting up of Indian Institute of Science or IISc Bangalore.
But by far, his largest contribution to the country were the Indian Institutes of Technology. It was under his leadership that the first IIT - IIT Kharagpur was set up in 1951.
He truly believed in the potential of IITs and had noted, 'I have no doubt that the establishment of this Institute will form a landmark in the progress of higher technological education and research in the country.’
