The prime task of any university, is to take the raw material out of the student community and teach them in a manner so that them become professionals and achieve great measure of social fulfillment. Crucial to this is the Teacher-Pupil relation. This is a dimension that is non-existent in JNU. That is why despite all extravagant claims JNU it does not feature in the global list of top 100 Universities in the QS World Universities Rankings.
A University where Faculty behaves like Trade Union thugs
Members of the JNU faculty are the biggest culprits. Luxuriating on State subsidy, leading merry lives of working only till lunch time, most of them are an indolent lot. Has any JNU Professor in past or present written any paper like Alan Turin, which seeded the industries of the future (the computer industry)? The two greatest scholars of the study of Indian Politics, DD Basu and SC Kashyap were products not of the University System but that of Professions.
And that explains everything. JNU Professors are not teachers they are the recruiting personnel for ultras. And just like trade union thugs vandalise factory premises and property in the name of protecting workers’ rights, they have vandalised the intellectual infrastructure of the university in the name of democracy and freedom of expression. They equate writing incendiary stuff for media platforms like Kafilla.org with academic work. Since JNU Professors have not performed the task for which they were hired, they need to be subjected to monthly performance review in line with the best evaluation practices globally.
Align courses, faculty to national priorities
The whole world celebrates the success of India’s economic reforms. Only the JNU Leftists bemoan it. Anything, which benefits India is attacked. Only few JNU Professors of the present crop will utter the words like India’s global role, the rest invariably prefix it with ‘so-called.’ This is their overarching philosophy.
The Achievements of Constitution are continually subverted
The Constitution of India, its birth, growth, maturity and its ongoing refinements are indeed a matter of wonder. When countries have struggled for decades, dealt with civil wars and enormous chaos, we have been governed on the basis of a Constitution and any effort to change this state of being is struck down. The challenge we face today in society is the downward filtration of our constitutional values. Particularly this is relevant when we consider the treatment of our women and depressed classes in social relations. Therefore Constitution study circles, as many as possible are needed.
Convert student unions into academic watchdogs
In the course of my voluntary work for students while running WOSY (World Organisation of Students & Youth – a body of international students in India), often I have had students come up to me and say that they don’t see any sense in what their teachers are teaching and that they could have taught the class in a better fashion.
This is serious feedback. The Key Performance Indicator (KPI) for a teacher is his/her teaching ability in a class. Therefore we must convert our student unions into academic watchdogs who maintain progress reports of various subjects on several variables. Our Student Unions must get this discipline.
This will be their contribution to Skill India. For India to become a high growth economy that world thinks it can, every section of the society has to play its role. It’s just not the government’s headache.
Rashmi Singh, School of International Studies (1996-1998), Editor of TelecomLive and InfraLive
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