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educational needs of all categories of established Utkarsh society under the
learners including science students who aegis of the Education Department to
may lack facilities, especially in remote implement it. Under this project, the
and rural areas. In this mode, the school curriculum-based pre-recorded videos
students, sitting at a distance, receive are telecast from Panchkula Studio
instructions through lectures pre- as per Time-Table. Currently, five
recorded by eminent experts which are channels, four Direct To Home (DTH)
later telecast through EduSat. This type and one Satellite Interactive Terminal
of setting provides an opportunity for (SIT), are used for this purpose. These
classroom teachers, sitting in remote- channels cater to the educational needs
rural schools, to become more creative of elementary, secondary, technical,
and instill creativity in students by using and higher education students. The
the latest technology of animation and government has also created a website
visual effects while presenting abstract www.haryanaedusat.com to help the
concepts. Visual experimentation students in this kind of learning.
is added as per the demand of the However, doubts and concerns as
content. The use of animation and regards the effectiveness of EduSat
simulated experimentation facilitates lectures have been expressed by many
the learning process to understand researchers at the national level. In a
abstract ideas directly (Bates, 1998). report by Azim Premji Foundation, it
The use of captions/ titles/ topics was put forward that EduSat lectures
on the screen helps the students to produced no robust evidence of
read/ write/ note the learning points improvement in the learning outcomes
and move at their own pace. The pre- of students. The pedagogical model
recorded lessons may be used time and of education implemented via EduSat
again to understand the concept better provided little opportunity for students
and explore the issues minutely. The to interact with teachers because pre-
animation and experimentation used recorded lessons are transmitted
by experts make the lectures lively and through Receive-Only Terminals (ROTs)
generate interest among the students to where students have no chance to
think in a new and novel way. Research ask questions. In a similar study, Dalal
shows that EduSat not only increases (2016) noted that the lack of trained
the attendance and retention of school manpower, improper monitoring,
students but also helps the teachers in and missing administrative ethics had
making their teaching more effective affected the performance of EduSat
and innovative (Chaudhary & Garg, adversely. This argument is supported
2010).
by the Comptroller and Auditor General
In Haryana, the EduSat project was (CAG) of India report in 2013 that 56
launched in 2007 to provide better percent of the EduSat terminals in
education to all with a focus on rural government schools in Haryana were
and remote areas. Initially, 9000 non-functional (Siwach, 2013). Similarly,
schools were selected for the “Haryana “The Indian Express” (2014, April 17)
EDUSAT Project” and the government revealed that the EduSat has failed in

208 Indian Journal of Educational Technology
Volume 3, Issue 2, July 2021