Like every year, rat race for securing admissions in reputed institutions with high brand value in has begun. At the same time, the story of sexual harassment of a student by a teacher in a College claiming a longstanding legacy of producing many among decision makers pose many perturbing questions about our education system. The truth about this case will emerge in investigation but this is surely not first one. Besides such aberrations, many cases of sex and drug rackets are talked about in institutions of higher learning. When students are breaking bars in obtaining marks why their ethical values, emotional quotient and social sensitivities are degrading is a critical question. It is true that this is a general social trend and educational institutions are not exception to this, institutions attracting top talent of the society are unable to provide answers to social ills is a cause of concern. The Macaulay founded system disconnected us from our cultural moorings and the so-called left-liberal ideological narrative provided justifications for such cut-off. While dealing with the number games either in terms of marks, money or votes, we need to initiate the process of reforming education and stall pushing our generations in the mad race for getting stamped by institutions.
Aavarana is a 2007 Kannada novel by novelist SL Bhyrappa. It is about Lakshmi, a free-spirited and intelligent girl, who breaks ties with her father to marry Amir, the man she loves. She converts to Islam, and changes her name to Razia. However, she is shocked to discover that her husband is not the open-minded, progressive individual he claimed to be. After marriage, Amir takes his family’s side in trying to force her to follow the more rigorous tenets of Islam. One of the important characters of Aavarana is Prof Shastri. He is the one who persuades Lakshmi to take up Islam as an act of rebellion against “oppressive Hinduism”. To top it, Prof Shastri though a family friend, doesn’t hesitates to molest Laxmi at every given opportunity. Prof Shastri is a typical secular intellectual that has tasted all kinds of wonderful benefits of being a celebrity Socialist in India.
Aavarana was sold out even before its release in February 2007. The novel went on to create a record in the Indian literary world by witnessing 10 reprints within five months of its release.
But I could still find one mistake even in such a successful novel.
Though Bhyrappa has defined every small thing in detail in the novel, like the houses and the villages people lived in but he completely ignores giving description of the college anywhere. I used to wonder what kind of college Lakshmi and Prof Shastri must be going to?
Some recent developments have given me an idea of the type of the college where one can find Prof Shastri and Lakshmi. Look at some of the following news:
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It seems, that these institutes have high cut-off marks for giving admissions to students; and in direct proportion have low morality as a selection criteria when it comes to Professors.
What is happening in St Stephen’s is not exception but a norm. Let’s look at few other institutes which have high cut off marks for admissions with Professors with low morality.
IIT, Mumbai
IIT Bombay was set to remove a professor for sexual harassment of a girl in 2011. By 2014, faculty and students celebrated “Kiss of Love” in the Convocation Hall Lawn, which is a sacrosanct place, reserved for convocation.
JNU, Delhi
In the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Durga Puja is being opposed since from 2001. Goddess Durga represents the female in its Shakti form and hence it is opposed tooth and nail by the liberals. In 2001, the then Dean of Student, MH Quraishi, stood in the front of the Durga Puja Pandal and exhorted the leftists and Islamists to break the Havan kund and throw the Pratima and Pandal out of the campus. (http://indiafacts.co.in/fact-sheet-jnu-mahishasura-day-controversy/)
This attitude of liberals towards female empowerment has a reason. An empowered female like Goddess Durga will be difficult to exploit in the name of liberalism. It doesn’t comes as a surprise when one reads that, a professor was suspended for sexually harassing female student (June 2013) in JNU and by 2015, a female professor was raped by a PhD student of the same university.
These institutes absorb the best brains of the country and kill them morally. It was evident when, in April 2010, after the terrible massacre of 76 CRPF jawans at Dantewada, JNU’s JNU Forum Against War on People (formed by Members of Democratic Students Union (DSU) and All India Students Association (AISA)) organised an event to celebrate the killings of jawans and raised slogans like ‘India murdabad, Maovad zindabad’. JNU has also seen protests against the hanging of 2001 Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru, and slogans like ‘If Bhagat Singh is your martyr, then Afzal Guru is ours’. Professors from International Studies department at JNU, Happyman Jacob and CK Ramakrishnan have spoken at such events.
With anti-national, pervert faculty in premium institutes, it is not surprising that none of the universities from India find a place in top 200 universities of India. Rather there is an obvious continuous fall in the ranking of Indian universities in the world.
The institutes known for high cut-off mark i.e. institutes which get the best talent from across India, have faculties with low moral and character.
Bhyrappa, was right in not describing the college, because ultimately it is the professors who make the college. Otherwise colleges on their own are mere buildings and students come and go. It is the professors who leave there imprints on students and the students go out and create a position of the college in the world.
It’s time government should not only look into the recruitment of faculties but also time to revaluate performance of existing faculties in government funded institutes and initiate corrective measures. Ultimately these institutes are being run on tax payer’s money can’t be used for anti-India and immoral activities. It is not only a question of student’s future but also a question of a nation’s future. The current model of “High on cut-off and low on moral”, need to stop with immediate effect.
Sandeep Singh
(The writer is founder www.swastik.net.in)
Education now appears to be a like a political vote-bank that is beneficiary of irrational subsidies only to face high end inflation. Tuition culture has prospered in an environment that menially pays to its teachers, with examination being set on repetitive patterns year after years.
Divyansh Dev
DU’s this year’s cut-off is a disappointment for many deserving candidates who may not have secured the rights marks to show their true potential and are essentially left behind in the rat race of skyrocketing percentages. These cut-offs also essentially proves two things, either our students are too intelligent or the marking systems now calls for a complete reconstruct. Ideally, a student must strive to achieve the best results, but here a reverse trend of the Board itself giving the best results to students, has called for this absurdity.
Education now appears to be a like a political vote-bank that is beneficiary of irrational subsidies only to face high end inflation. Tuition culture has prospered in an environment that menially pays to its teachers, with examination being set on repetitive patterns year after years.
Today, an army of rote learners who mugged up their NCERT textbooks instead for applying its essence is still not eligible to fight the warfare. They have been tested on standardised answer keys and not the application of content.
Why is that upon completion of degree, we don’t see a wordsmith-when a Delhi University (DU) college demands 99 per cent for studying English, or a genius, who is a DU made mathematician or a scientist and is currently contributing to the world? In these modern day factories of education, students are getting manufactured only as a probable workforce that meets demands of the industries.
These skyscrapers of a cut-off have led to two major problems. Firstly, it has ensured that lower income students from government schools without access to ‘tuition’ stay away from mainstream education. Secondly, it has ensured thriving of private institutions that demand lacs of fees per semester.
Seema Bajaj whose son is not able to secure admission in the college of his choice says “Even with a 95 per cent we have to wait for the second cut-off to get my son admitted in the course of his choice”. As a parent she is thinking to enroll him in a popular private institution based in Delhi NCR, if she is left with no other choice.
“There is no uniform parameter to scale the marks achieved by students in various Boards across the country. Kerala and Tamil Nadu Education Boards have frequent scorers of 100 per cent whereas few from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh State boards manage to cross even 85 per cent. This disparity in awarding of marks also fuels the current state of cut-offs at Delhi University”, says Namrita Jain assistant professor of commerce at Delhi University.
Recently, 35 quadrillion Zimbabwean dollars (35,000,000, 000,000,000) equaled one US dollar. Inflated system of grading and marking in India now seems to draws a contrast with current exchange rate of Zimbabwean currency. The cut-offs here are the Zimbabwean dollars that can be exchanged for 1 US dollar worth of skill set invested in students after 15 years of schooling.
The Taliban have been on the offensive for some time now. Civilian casualties in the first three months of 2015 are up 8 per cent compared over the same period of a year ago. In specific terms, there were 136 deaths and 386 injuries. Anti-government forces were responsible for 73 per cent of all casualties, with 14 per cent attributed to security and pro-government forces. The deterioration in the situation becomes clearer when one looks at civilian casualties from mortar and rocket fire. These went up by 43 per cent to 266 (62 deaths, 204 injuries) and accounted for half of all civilian casualties from ground engagement. In earlier years, Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and suicide bombs were overwhelming responsible for all civil deaths with very little actual armed engagement. However, with the withdrawal of US and other North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) forces, the Taliban have emerged as a fighting force who are taking on the Afghan security forces head on. Targeted assassinations are also on the rise to undercut government’s credibility, and to create fear in the minds of the Taliban’s enemies.
President Ashraf Ghani who came to power as a result of compromise brokered between him and Abdullah, now his chief executive, which broke the deadlock caused by the inconclusive elections marred by allegations of large scale irregularities. Abdullah had led the first round quite conclusively but when Ghani seemed to have obtained a plurality of votes in the second round, counting had to be suspended. Once the agreement was reached, the Election Commission declared Ghani the winner but till date final voting figures have not been released. The circumstances leading to the formation of this unusual governing arrangement, the government of national unity, which goes beyond Constitutional provisions, may not be incidental to the political quagmire Afghanistan seems to be headed into. The government has not had a smooth sailing, and had great difficulty first in agreeing on names of ministers, and then getting parliament to ratify these nominations. In fact, the crucial post of defence minister has been vacant for nine months, with the first two nominees failing to get approval. The Taliban attack took place even as the second Vice President Sarwar Danish was introducing Masoom Stanekzai, the third nominee for defence minister, to Parliament, which according to the Taliban spokesman was the time chosen for the attack. .
President Ghani’s unexpected approach to Pakistan, through China and directly, was recognised as a high risk strategy and many Afghan commentators argued against it. Ghani’s unstated assumption was that there can be no peace in Afghanistan unless the Pakistan army was on board. They are seen alternatively as controlling the Taliban, using them as their ‘strategic asset’, or having leverage over them. And Ghani rightly assessed that only the Chinese have leverage over the Pakistan Army. In fact, Ghani reached out to the Pakistan Army, recognising that the latter was actually a more ‘appropriate’ interlocutor. The Afghan Government cracked down on anti-Pakistan Army elements and handed over to Pakistan even those who had been given shelter. Army-to-army links at the Corp commanders’ level, coordinated patrols and operations, deputing Afghan military cadets for training in Pakistan etc have been operationalised. Recently, ISI and the Afghan intelligence agency (NDS) have, controversially, signed an agreement to carry out joint counter-terrorists operations and for the training of NDS personnel in Pakistan. The NDS chief opposed the agreement. Perhaps the most controversial part of the agreement is that the two agencies will not spy on each other, with almost no one believing that the ISI will keep its end of the bargain. Even as this is being written, the Afghan intelligence spokesperson, Hassib Sediqqi, said that an ISI officer helped the Haqqani network, a Taliban affiliate, carry out the attack on parliament. According to him, the suicide car bomb was manufactured in Peshawar, and the NDS were aware of the impending attack as early as June 10th. Consequently they had beefed up security arrangements at the complex.
Despite such unilateral concessions by Afghanistan, the expected peace dividend is yet to be seen. Far from the Taliban ceasing attacks and coming over-ground to engage with the Afghan Government, it has in fact stepped up its attacks. This is despite Taliban representatives travelling to Beijing, engaging different interlocutors in Qatar and elsewhere, and more recently with a cross-section of Afghan civil society including women rights activists, NGOs etc. But it has singularly refused to respond to the Afghan Government’s offer for talks. The Taliban are now emboldened enough to directly controlling territory after ousting Afghan security forces and government representatives. Earlier, they would create insecurity, plant IEDs, carry out targeted assassinations and in general keep different area destabilised. Recently, they seized that strategically important Musa Qala district of North Helmand, posing a threat to the security of the Kajaki dam. Over the last week, after surrounding Afghan security forces, they have taken control over two districts in Kunduz province– Chardara and Dasht-i-Archi. Kabul city resembles a locked-down garrison, with Taliban suicide bombers able to get into Interior ministry, hotels with long-term foreign occupants etc and cause mayhem.
Side by side, there are also reports of the emergence of the Islamic State, or Daesh, in Afghanistan. The first reports that emerged in mid-2014 from Ghazni turned out to be false, but subsequently there have been a number of reports that disaffected Afghan insurgents have aligned with the IS, along with a number of Pakistani Taliban. The IS has appointed Hafeez Saeed Khan as the Wali (Governor) of Khorasan, historically an area encompassing most of southern and western Afghanistan and north-eastern Iran. Mullah Abdul Rauf Khadim, a senior Taliban commander and former Guantanamo Bay detainee has become Khan’s deputy. Reportedly there have been a number of clashes between the Taliban and IS, though there could be a tendency to overestimate the latter’s strength. Many local government security chiefs cite the IS threat to be able to garner more resources, and small time ‘warlords’ claim allegiance to IS in order to increase their profile, and seek accommodation with the government. Overall, the Taliban is too pervasive to allow the IS much space.
If these developments were not confusing enough, evidence is surfacing about an informal alliance between the Taliban and their former enemies, Iran. This is not the first time that Iran has supplied armour piercing explosives and other armaments to the Taliban, earlier against their common enemy, the US and now to face down the perceived IS threat. This tactical alliance cannot last as fundamentally, the two are opposed to the other, but in the meantime, the old adage ‘ my enemy’s enemy is my friend’ seems to be in operation.
Constitutionally, Afghanistan faces a crisis. Parliament’s term is over but in the prevailing situation, it looks difficult to conduct any elections. President Ghani has extended its term but the legal grounds for such an extension are shaky. Inability to form a functional government for months led to paralysis in governance and severely tested the credibility of the agreement underpinning the government. Even at present the Supreme Court, the Attorney General’s office and the Constitutional Oversight Commission have acting heads. This inability to govern could easily morph into a test not just of credibility but of legitimacy, with questions being asked about the legality of both the executive and the legislature, and even of the judiciary.
Post-2001 governments have suffered regularly from credibility deficits, but never of legitimacy. A deteriorating security environment, weakening economy as a result of draw down of development assistance and governance breakdown in a situation where the neighbours continue to act as if Afghanistan were their strategic depth does not bode well for that country as well as its neighbourhood. Ghani’s gambit of trying to involve China to help stabilise seems dangerously close to failure. The question remains that were Afghanistan to implode, will it effects be limited to within its borders, or would be push the unravelling of its eastern neighbour?
Shakti Sinha
(The writer is a Retired Civil Servant.)
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