The issues faced by our society are like a link of a chain. In addition, the strongest link in that chain of our society is Illiteracy. The root cause of our backwardness in most fields is illiteracy. Illiteracy in our society is characterized by wide gaps between the urban and rural population. 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.

Campaigns for the eradication of this drawback gathered momentum in the past four decades after independence; the results are as expected, dramatic. As per the 2001 census, the overall literacy rate of India is 65.38% and most importantly the difference between the highest and lowest literacy rate is very high in India. Kerala with the highest literacy rate 90.92% while Bihar with the lowest 47.53%. There is no need for any sophisticated technique to explain the root cause of this paradox, as it is obviously the result of the rapid growth of population. The rapid growth of population has outpaced whatever little progress had been achieved in literacy.

The data for literacy percentage in India, though alarming fails to ascribe how the population problem is responsible, despite being one of the most used statistics of illiteracy in India. After all, if the UN is using that metric in their Annual Address, it must be right! Poverty at its core is a life crippling condition. But literacy is not. The acquisition of money makes for a better wager than the acquisition of literacy, ergo education. Let us make the case for literacy in the information age. While the current rate of computer literacy in India is acceptable, we still treat ourselves as a third-world country. Many NGOs have found that it is not the technology that is a problem, but the fact that people can’t read.