response to - 'Teachers, isn't it time to teach'

I read the threat by Dr. Sunil Sondhi (http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/open-page/article487680.ece) wherin he has tried to remind us of our duties. The author seems to be suffering from an extreme myopic understanding on education. Recently when even school teaching has started giving attention towards all-round development of students, he thinks that learning is only done in the classrooms. His handicapped vision needs immediate correction wherein he argues that students’ elections, festivals and other co-curricular activities are wastage of time. He must be enlightened that for an all-round development of a student one needs to have some leadership qualities (developed during students elections), some organizational skills (developed during organizing festivals) as well as some team-spirit that are developed during other extra-curricular activities. I understand that there is no substitute to student-teacher interaction but it should include their guidance in all these activities along with the classroom interaction and discussions on the course-content. In fact we also have an added responsibility to educate them by showing live-examples exhibiting our own reactions towards an autocratic functioning a vice-chancellor as he decides to flout all rules, regulations and established practices and procedures of governance. Lastly I would ask him to be careful in future while extrapolating his data for schools onto the colleges and would remind him that unlike schools where parents prefer private institutions compared to the government schools actually many government colleges/institutions are rated better than the private money-generating institutions. Amity and Ansal institute of technology are starved of good students whereas IITs, DCE, DIT and NITs get flooded by brilliant students. And no one needs to be educated about the enviable record of attracting admission seekers that Delhi University exhibits during admission-time year after year. I agree that there is an immense scope for improvement but that can be achieved only by including teachers in this process and not by neglecting those who have made this University the most sought after of all Indian universities.

Effect of the 'Fake Encounter'

The wishful thinking “The BJP goes for its own jugular” (Counterpoint, HT July 25 issue) of Vir Sanghvi needs further analysis.

We have witnessed how BJP often tries to project the issue of foreign origin hoping that this will pin down the Congress but they never get the desired result as they fail to understand that the Congress has risen from ashes only with the rise of Sonia despite the common knowledge of her origin. For the voters this is already a well known fact and hence already taken into account of. In another similar case, the fodder scam was never an eye-opener for the voters of Laloo and hence the scam never had the effect as was desired by those who raised the issue. It is also not difficult to understand that a sting operation “unveiling” that Raj Thackerey is spitting venom against ‘north Indians’ and ‘biharis’ would be actually helping him to hold on to his vote bank. Another sting operation showing that CPI(M) is supporting naxal movement is in fact going to benefit them.

We often forget to analyze the circumstances and reasons that led to the rise of BJP in India. We must first acknowledge that the party rose to occupy the central place in Indian politics only after the demolition of Babri Masjid and also that Gujrat is under BJP rule for so long only due to the prevailing public perception of their way of handling of the Godhra issue. All attempts therefore to prove that they are not ‘secular’ acually help their cause. In fact these efforts help BJP in creating an image that they themselves will probably feel helpless in building up due to the constitutional constraints. BJP has never been considered as a secular party in the way this phrase is widely understood. BJP tried to change the understanding of this term in order to qualify for becoming the ‘true secular’ party and also by branding others as ‘pseudo-seculars’. All instances that the media try to blow sometimes out of proportion to prove that they are not secular actually help BJP to keep their vote bank intact. Analysis would conclude strongly in favour of the fact that the decline of BJP started as they tried to occupy the place reserved for Congress in Indian politics. Whether one likes it or not but the fact remains that Modi has risen against all odds just because the public at large believes all allegations imposed on him to be true. His ‘charishma’ starts fading whenever confusion begins to prevail about these allegations. Just when people start doubting his role in Godhra issue, some sting operation or the other helps them in reestablishing their faith.

To be precise, Pragya Thakur’s case shocked the BJP voters, Kausarbi’s murder too has the potential to shock them, but you can never surprise them with the disclosure that Shohrabuddin died in a fake encounter. And therefore it is just a wishful thinking of some that Amit Shah’s or for that matter Modi’s arrest is going to make BJP suffer. More often than not these “disclosures” have gone in favour of BJP in the past.

Hope to Live in a Plural Country

The author has proven his point that “For Hindus the enemy is within” with his article itself (“For Hindus the Enemy is within”, Mail Today, page 10 on July 20, 2010 http://epaper.mailtoday.in/Details.aspx?boxid=104296&id=39540&issuedate=2072010). Ironically, the article thereby implies that the other religion faces threat only from outside. It is indeed a fact that Hinduism is the only religion that exists with its enemy within itself. But that is its strength. The author must realize that it is the plurality of the ‘Hindu way of life’ that allows his mainstream opinion to exist along with the minority (in his opinion?) opinions of Modis, Mohans, Togadias and Advanis. It is the Hindu way of life that welcomes the author with a space for reinterpreting the message conveyed by the 'Deva' and 'Asura' conflict existing in Hindu mythology. A similar article will find no space in the “other way of life” if one dares to replace the word ‘Asura’ by ‘Kafira’. The Hindu way of life is clearly absent when Omars, Mehboobas, Yasirs, Afzals and Geelanis give the impression of representing the same face of a coin. It is also not visible when Musharrafs, Zardaris, ISI, Quasabs and Qureshis speak the same language of religion. I agree with the author when he argues that all forms of terror are same however he must realize that it is Hinduism that gives him the strength to condemn the greater threat which is saffron in his opinion. The author derives strength from this Hindu way of life when according to him legitimizing ‘violence to unify humanity’ poses an ignorable threat to our society but legitimization of ‘retaliatory saffron violence’ qualifies for being a much greater threat. I can only pray and hope to continue to live in a society where majority advocates for a way of life that allows authors like Jyotirmay Sharma to freely express his views against the majority.

Death of Science Courses in Delhi University

(edited version of this article has been published in Mail Today 6/6/2010 edition on page 4 http://epaper.mailtoday.in/Details.aspx?boxid=5445921&id=37546&issuedate=662010 ).

We have seen it happening before our eyes when a popular course such as B.Sc. (General) was being ruined before us by the earlier Vice-Chancellor Dr. Deepak Nayyar who changed it to B.Sc. (Programme). Now we are on the verge of witnessing the same fate destined for the other Science courses. I remember, only few years ago I was present in a meeting of science teachers that was called by Prof. S.K.Tandon for imposing a structural change in all the science courses. It was vehemently opposed by the teachers led by Late Dr. Swaminathan of St. Stephens. Forcing a bio-student to study mathematics and a non-medical science student to study bio-papers compulsorily was pointed out as one of the major reason of concern and it was warned that this factor itself had a potential to compel students to stay away from joining this course. Teachers were able to resist its implementation but unfortunately the whole resistance was cunningly interpreted as an opposition with regard to Honours courses and the same structure was clandestinely imposed on the B.Sc.(General) course. All nightmares that the teachers had visualized in the meeting have come true for the course. The result is everybody to see as the cut-off percentages have dropped alarmingly only for this course and majority of colleges are now unable to fill up the seats allotted to them. However we all know that Prof. Tandon was rewarded with the post of Pro-Vice-Chancellor after that.
In the current case, our present Vice-Chancellor seems to have written his own ‘bible’ and wants everybody to follow the same without questioning its utility, importance, relevance, desirability and feasibility. He seems to have got such a fixation with interdisciplinary courses that he thinks that all those who have otherwise a very good grasp on Zoology and Botany are absolutely worthless if they have not studied undergraduate mathematics. His ‘bible’ predicts that the Semester System is so important that even if it is taught by unwilling teachers and handled by incompetent authority present in the university and the examinations, it will solve all problems gripping the Delhi University education system. He believes that just because the UK and USA have it and just because the government ‘thinks?’ it should be there, the semester system should be adopted. The fact, that his ‘bible’ conveniently ignores, is the common knowledge that there are many foreign university ready to pay huge sum of seed money as registration charges and are forcing the HRD ministry and the Government to succumb to their diktats. They are willing to open corridors in the name of establishing educational institutions and will engage themselves in luring the Indian students studying undergraduate courses in Indian universities to encourage lateral shifts to similar courses at their campus. Only they are going to be benefited immensely if our university system collapses and in the process exposes our inability to handle the inherent difficulty and unmanageable contradictions associated with the semester system in our university environment. Our university education will be dumped to a corner that will be similar to the space occupied by the government schools in primary and secondary educations. We would just become irrelevant and they just want that. Their target seems to be to hurt the enviable crowd-pulling-ability of the maddening admission-seekers’-rush of our university.
I would like simple answers to the following open queries from those who have never bothered to answer any of these questions and even shied away from a much desirable debate in the Academic Council.
· In our university system, admissions are allowed till September. And this should not be stopped since colleges must be given chance to fill their vacant seats that are left by a majority of students availing the opportunity to move into either a better college or a better course. Admissions particularly in science courses get stabilized only in September as they get a chance to move to an engineering/medical college outside our university. Can anybody let me know that in the semester system how the hell they are supposed to get prepared for the semester examinations just after getting admitted in September? In our system at least first year of science courses should be annual even if somebody is hell-bent on imposing the semester system. For this reason the semester system can be successfully and somewhat meaningfully forced only in the second and third year.
· Can they provide a list of those benefits that can be achieved only in semester system but neither in an annual system and also nor in a system of continuous evaluation of students based on weekly tests? The fact remains that a system is never good or bad in absolute sense but one will have to assess that how frequently can examinations be held in a university having same course running in fifty plus colleges with number of students counting over several tens of thousands.
· In our university system where preparations, conduct and evaluation occupy whole year of the examination department for annual exam what steps they have taken to wrap the whole process in three to four months?We all know that due to some unavoidable local problems (such as a teacher going on a long leave or appointment of a fresh teacher taking inordinately long time while trying to follow the complex process being adopted by the university) appointment of a fresh teacher invariably gets delayed by a few months. In an annual system a fresh teacher always gets a chance to complete the syllabus by engaging some extra classes but how will this be possible in a semester system?