This year,We have been able to achieve something which, most probably , no other educational institution in any country in the rest of the world has been able to achieve. Yes, a 100% cut-off! As unprecedented and weird as it may sound , its a bit of an achievement for our great education system! Only we could manage manage such a feat!
Blame me for being Sarcastic, but what else do you expect ? A brief look at the Brobdingnagian effort which successive governments have made in the education sector since independence , and you'll know what i'm talking about!
We have set up universities when we needed schools, given reservation to the underprivileged when they needed books and pencils , and we have let our brightest minds desert us when we needed them to give back something to the society!
For more than 40 years after independence, we set up a few elite universities and colleges , boasted about the quality of education in these institutions , and forgot about the rest of the country! We forgot the underprivileged, the children in the villages,the youth on the streets. We were happy with just a handful of IITs and IIMs.
By the time the 80s arrived, we had to give them something! Somebody had to make up for the 40 years of ignorance and inaction. Somebody had to pay for the 40 years of incompetence and absurdness. When we looked outside our windows, we saw them but pretended not to , they were helpless , with stones in their hands, and flames on their bodies! So, we sat around a table. And we came up with "The Mandal".
It would be wrong to say that merit committed suicide the day Mandal came up. It was actually hung up the barn!
Suddenly, The great economic reforms arrived , and everyone else other than those who were meant to, which is the government, started building walls and ceilings , and we were told that these were modern day colleges and universities! We believed! Almost simultaneously, some of those people started building walls and ceilings which would make it easier for us to get into those colleges! They called it coaching institutes! We believed again!
Then came The Arjun! And just like Arjun , the mythological character in the Mahabharata, he too had an accurate and perfect aim. The irony being that the target was 'The Great Indian Education System'! Rest is modern History!
We played saviour to the underprivileged and the uneducated, but that would have been possible only when more and more people would be deprived of education. Its like keeping people in poverty, so that we can play Robin Hood!
The percentage of reservation increased instead of the number of colleges and universities. The percentages of cut-off increased , instead of the number of seats and courses.
And then came a day when a student was denied admission into an institution because he did not have more than 100% marks! The precipice had been breached. Our Education System did not die that fateful day.
It died a silent death a long time ago! What we are hearing today is the echo of its requiem. And the question which stares us in the face is.. What Next?
P.S.- I have used the word "WE" instead of "Our Government" deliberately. We the elite have chosen and rejected governments and policies over the past half a century and more in this country. Its about time we stopped blaming the government for everything , and owned up to a few mistakes we have made along the way!
