It
is a case of colonial mindset that has established the supremacy of
literary knowledge over wisdom. Wisdom comes from experience and the way
that you lap up the opportunity you get in your life. We are yet to
learn that any education system only helps in getting the opportunity
but how to make use of that is never prompted by your acquired degrees.
Though slightly less prevalent in Sciences it is somehow commonplace in
Social Sciences to count and weigh the bibliography attached to one's
statement before even giving it a hearing. Earlier to British invasion
we probably never had a tradition of measuring the importance to a
saying by weighing its originator. Traditionally we have been otherwise
told that true knowledge is what that makes you bow with humility and
prepares you to remain open for wisdom that can come from any quarter.
The prevalent education started primarily by Britishers and later
developed through Left-leaning brand of 'intellectuals' were wary of the
vast knowledge and wisdom then existed in this ancient country and just
out of fear established a rule to set aside all potential challenges to
their fiefdom. They made reading, rote learning, passing exams and
acquiring degrees essential for getting heard and noticed.
It is exactly this mind set that rates an English speaking fool better
than someone arguing in a regional language. It is exactly this mindset
that makes Mani Shankar Aiyar so rude to a 'tea seller' Modi. It is this
rotten system of education that has injected arrogance into Maken who
wants to stop a Smriti getting a chance to perform fearing that her
performance might not give him another chance to raise such doubts.
Kapils and Tharoors are the glaring products of this system who acquired
arrogance through their degrees and have become completely
non-receptive to any idea that has not originated from their school of
thoughts. And for those who still doubt in this wisdom should at least
learn from the attitude of the students of Harward University and IIM
who did not ask Lalu to show his management degrees when he was called
to deliver a lecture to share his experience in managing Indian
Railways. I just hope that just an 'educated' Vivekananda had to roam
around in search for an 'uneducated' Guru Ramkrishna Paramhans for his
enlightenment, others do not find it that hard to get one of their own. Sri
Aurobindo, a great yogi of Bengal once said: "India became free
on the day when arrogant youth (Swamy Vivekananda) who had been to British schools bowed
down humbly before the illiterate saint, knowing that he carried within
him a greater power."
Education, in true sense, is a progressive discovery of your own ignorance.
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