It is important to ask uncomfortable questions. To begin with, the allegation of question paper leaks is not the only problem (File)
Yet another suicide in Kota. A news report of this kind, it seems, does not shock us anymore. We have, possibly, taken it for granted that life is essentially a race that worships success and stigmatises failure, and those who cannot bear the pressure of this hyper-competitive culture, or do not internalise its rationale of social Darwinism are psychologically weak and emotionally vulnerable. They are not “smart” enough. Hence, even though students’ suicide is the new normal — this year, already, 12 young aspirants died by suicide in Kota — our love affair with this notorious coaching factory continues.
Unless your child or mine doesn’t take the extreme step, we will not wake up; and we will continue to believe that there is a singular meaning of education — instrumental and ruthless. The measure of the relevance of knowledge/skills is only in terms of the salary package. And students must be efficient enough to repress whatever diverts them from instrumental/ strategic learning for “cracking” the hugely problematic standardised tests like IIT-JEE or NEET. Although the recent scams related to NET and NEET have caused some anguish, it is unlikely that we will go deeper, interrogate the very rationale of these sorts of standardised tests, reflect meaningfully on the damage the coaching industry has caused to education, and destroyed the creative imagination of the young.
It is important to ask uncomfortable questions. To begin with, the allegation of question paper leaks is not the only problem. The very rationale of the MCQ-centric standardised tests like NEET or JEE is faulty. Far from evaluating one’s academic knowledge, critical spirit, creative imagination and personality traits, these exams act like dehumanised/ computerised instruments for eliminating, instantly, lakhs of young aspirants. A standardised test eliminates quickly — almost like a lottery; it is not designed to select those who are really inclined — intellectually and psychologically — to become engineers and doctors. It demands a war-like strategy — say, how to think instantly without much probing, tick the one and only one “correct answer” on the OMR sheet, and solve, say, 180 riddles in physics, chemistry and biology in 200 minutes! To prepare for this sort of exam is to deny the creativity of a free/ relaxed mind — the ability to go deeper into academic complexities, entertain ambiguities and raise new questions. In fact, the very nature of this sort of standardised test leads to the mushrooming growth of coaching centres.
The reason is that to crack this sort of meaningless test, you do not require the intellectual/ philosophical company of a great pedagogue or a creative teacher. Instead, you need coaching centre strategists; you require well-packaged “success manuals”; the capacity for rote learning. Most of all, the “aspirant” must be ready to pass through endless drilling from morning to evening — a mechanical process of solving thousands of MCQs, through weekly tests, monthly tests and mock tests.
Is it, therefore, surprising that we have normalised “dummy” schools? As “smart” parents, we prefer to send our children to Kota or other coaching factories. And these empty schools exist only to conduct board exams! Yes, as coaching centres flourish, “exam warriors” replace creative wanderers, and the mythology of “placements and salary packages” colonises the lifeworld. Everything about truly life-affirming and meaningful education is forgotten. Our children grow up with psychic stress, heightened loneliness and symbolic violence. For sanity and peace, you need the guidance of educationists/philosophers like Jiddu Krishnamurti and Rabindranath Tagore; for sharpening the spirit of critical pedagogy, you need the kind of teachers who love to walk with Paulo Freire and bell hooks; for entering into the depths of knowledge in science and humanities, you need the light of great scholars and literary figures.
But then, when coaching centre strategists replace great teachers, scholars and pedagogues — and young people remain deprived of good literature, cinema or music as they have no time to “waste” — you can only witness a great loss.
Amid the uproar over the scams related to NEET and NET, I wonder whether we are really sincere in going deeper, understanding the root of the problem and striving for a meaningful and life-sustaining education. We can move forward only when we are bold and honest enough to accept that whatever exists is pathological (in a way, Kota is an embodiment of this sickness). There is more to life than becoming a doctor/engineer with a huge salary package, and above all, the deeper riddles of life and society cannot be reduced into the form of MCQs.
Pathak writes on culture and education
