News and Views of a Hypocrite

Congrats for breaking a cliche, Delhi!
How many times have you felt or have heard that sports is always given a second place to education in India? I know, right? The best player in your hockey team skips practice and your team suffers because he has an exam that Monday. Or some of the young talents just disappear off the map just when they are peaking, because of the board exams. However, we cannot complain that way any longer. Delhi, the capital city has set a precedent that the whole nation can be proud of. For the first time, brace yourself folks, Sports has been given the importance that has been reserved for Education. Kudos to the capital city. Thank you for making us all proud. We appreciate the fact that INR 28000 CRORES (nearly 7 billion USD) has been spent in making Delhi a worldclass city for the CWG; an event which will make sure that we project the best picture possible as the developing nation that everybody talks about. Screw the naysayers, who clamour that it is just a repeat of what China did for the Olympics. They don't know squat about advertising. Thank you Delhi, for showing the world that India is not the land of snake charmers and rope tricks. Who really cares if that comes at the cost of clearing off "inconvenient" people creating eye-sores for our esteemed guests? Wait a minute, most of them are not coming? Why? Because the infrastructure is poor? Those bastards. Don't they know that whatever we are doing, we are doing at the cost of building new schools and staffing existing schools? Shame on them. Screw Azim Premji who talks about the unhealthy living conditions for construction workers from the most difficult circumstances in India; we can send them right back to Bihar once the work of "beautifying" our Capital City is done. What is it that you are saying? Bihar does not have enough schools? If we have too many schools there, who will be the construction workers that build the infrastructure of New Age India? Come on, there is a bigger picture here you sentimental idiots. Now, let us all bend over. Delhi has something to say...

The Confusing case of the Good, the Bad and the Ugly
THE GOOD: Did you know that the Tamil Nadu government has done away with the pass/fail system upto class nine? After those years of education, each student will be given an elementary education completion certificate. I salute the good people who made this direction possible. Education for all. Hats off to the brave people who made this possible. Now, the pressure that equates performance to marks will give way for some creative, holistic development in the student who until recently, resembled a pack-mule with books.
THE BAD: The same govt also imposed the long-awaited and much needed cap on the amount collected per term by private schools in Tamil Nadu. Now, from a distance, this looks like a responsible move. And when I think of schools that made a culture out of snobbery and sold its seats to the highest bidders, it is a rule that should be implemented with utmost vehemence. But there are schools which do not necessarily do that. There are schools which sponsor some ofthe students from a tough background with their fees and uniforms. This is where the "Bad" part of this rule kicks in; as the big fish tear through this rule with their rating system and facilities expenses (as they can charge for extra classes and make it unofficially mandatory to make up for the lost revenue), and the small schools that care about the students get jacked. The average salary of a teacher in a small private school is far from attractive. The old axiom that only those who can't do, teach, is coming true more with the passing day; with a small change, as only those who can't do IT, teach. (when I say IT, I mean Information Technology, my perverted readers). That the first casualty of this cap on fees is going to be the quality of teachers, for the salaries are bound to go down from the current bad state. Though attractive salaries should not be the force that drives someone towards the vocation of teaching, don't the teachers live in the real world as well? With the UGC making sure that established professors could easily take home up to half a lakh per month as salary, and govt teachers' association making sure that teachers can live with comfort and security; what sin have the private school teachers done to be left uncared for?
THE UGLY: Now, another dangerous angle that we have to consider due to this measure is attrition. Those around the 30 year mark would not think twice about going IT; and even if they are not fit for the field the could easily opt for the numberless BPOs and Call-centers. It would look like that such attrition is not possible from those who are considered "seniors" (past the young age of 35, if you would believe me). Consider this; if such a teacher realizes that not only is the salary never going to improve but also it may suffer a downslide? What? Would they not be making a LOT more money for a lot LESS work if they start, get this, a private tuition centre? Last I checked, there are NO boards/checks/restrictions/fee-caps for tuitions. All this, and the timing is pretty flexible? Now, those teachers would be crazy not to think about these options. I once knew a chemistry teacher who had retired from active teaching (voluntary retirement). He taught three sessions in the morning and four in the evening. Each session had class thrice a week. So, there were fourteen batches. Each batch had about 40 students. He charged just 500 rupees from each student. He taught from the comforts of his residence. So he made a net profit of at least 2.5 lakhs per month. The year was 1999-2000. Now, in 2010, I still know teachers who scrape a living out of salaries 3000 per month. The govt which made an oh-so-grand declaration about cutting down school fees, has sadly done very little about the high attrition in teachers. That is plain UGLY; and dangerously so.