Edge-ucation?/lost among pigeons and crumbs.

Edge-ucation?/lost among pigeons and crumbs.

A student of Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), where a friend of mine studies, committed suicide the night before last. This was the fourth incident of its kind in four years! The reason for this suicide is not known, but most of these are said to have happened because of attendance problems. Students failing to maintain 75% attendance in each semester are expelled from the institution and are required to start from the first semester if they wish to finish their degree.

A couple of weeks back I was discussing an issue taken up by a lecturer, a senior official at the RBI, at the BSE with a friend. At the end of the conversation she said, “You seem to have been preparing hard for group discussions (GD).” (management students require doing so to get admissions in B-Schools).

So everything one ‘does’, all conversations ‘made’ are to pass an examination or go through a GD! Of course, a leading coaching institution chooses to call it ‘Edgeucation’.

The Tsunami led the students of TISS to demand from the institution a relief camp in Tamil Nadu. On being told that it would happen when TISS assesses the situation and sets a concrete objective, the ‘seniors’ launched a procession. Now that the trip is finalized, the seniors want to wait until the on-campus recruitment is done with.

Students will have to do 30 days of extra field-work if they opt out of the Tamil Nadu trip. That is what happened of it. The students now are upset as it was supposed to be a voluntary trip! India surely doesn’t need the compulsory military service rule.

What is the purpose of education? Sounds like a very clichéd melodramatic question to me; but am quite often led to think. Stories of fifteen-year-olds ending their lives because they did not score too well in their tenth grade exams are not new news that are printed in newspapers every June, when results are declared. Students distributing sweets for passing the exams (is a custom in India), and at the same time are weeping rivers because they scored ‘only’ 94% and will not get admission in VJTI (one of the top engineering schools) are a common sight.

Why? Why when Kerela boasts of 99% literacy rate because 99% of the people there can write their names? I have no answer. Seems we all get lost among pigeons and crumbs.

"Comon Dhruv... get over it."

31st night was quite spectacular! I was in my room praying before
going to bed and within a few minutes was woken up by what sounded
to me like gun shots(these days I do not seem to see but tragedy),
it was fire crackers. Noisy and colorful. The already bright Mumbai
sky at midnight was even brighter and glittering. Cheeks glisten
when tears roll down. Times of India, that day had a headline on the
front page that went 'Celebration: a sweet sorrow' or something
something like that. It basically justified new year celebrations.
It talked about getting over what has happened in the past. Fuck,
how can something like the Tsunami be over and be regarded as past?
We are in the middle of the whole thing. 150,000 people dead and
counting!

A lot of my friends were partying that night. Nothing agianst that.
(This is not moral policing. Not a Shiv Sainik.) But most of them
were: "C'mon Dhruv, get over it". "Even we observed a minute's
silence at 12", said one. Anyway...

When Cars fly:
So today my mom and aunt returned from their tour of north India. We
were going to my aunt's, when we drove past slums of Kurla. The
slums are on the sides of an elevated road. There is no railing, or
side wall or any sort of protection! On the edge of the road were
children shitting (in the mornings, even adult men do it). If any
rich drunk lost control of his expensive SUV(remember Salman?), at
least a few people would die, not too many... Of course the drunk
will pay the families off. If a heavy duty lorry would, The driver
would lose his feet, because he couldn't apply the brakes; hands,
because he couldn't control the wheel; and eyes, because he couldn't
see(This is a true incident in Kolkata). Of course, the roads are so
beautiful that a tyre burst in the truck is inevitable. May be the
SUV had a trye burst though. Oh I saw a speeding red ferrari there.
It just needed wings.

We sure have a lot of respect for humanity and life! Shiv Sena of
course is one of the best example by wanting to drive out non
Maharashtrians out of Mumbai to decrease the congestion and
increasing the quality of life here!!!

"C'mon Dhruv, get over it."

Will we ever have another reason but Cricket that will unite the
nation? Another Sourav to lead? Another Irfan?

C'mon Dhruv, get over it...