e-Nagar

2 years ago I started cooking for myself. However I had to abort the entire project in the midway, because my stomach could no longer take the torture of digesting the food cooked by me. I am not alone, typically a guy tries to avoid learning how to cook for as long as he can afford to (by hiring a maid on monthly basis or on permanent basis through marriage) Indian Girls are on the other hand literally forced to learn cooking and serving.

However whenever I eat some really delicious food, it is very likely that a guy-chef or the male member of the household has prepared it. One of the best hospitality experiences are when I am served by males.

I am not a MCP who is trying to prove that males are superior in a female activity. What I am trying to say is… most guys cook/serve not out of compulsion but due to passion. While most females cook/serve because they have to.

The only difference between an Average performer and a Top performer is simply PASSION. To excel in life, one needs to pick up an activity which he/she loves, and pursue it with complete dedication.

Combing back to my rambling on education:
India has tens of thousands of graduate engineers. But even then most IT companies find them sub-standard. This is because most Indians pick engineering and software industry out of compulsion and not out of choice.

“You can take a horse to the water but you cannot make it drink”

One should always go by the spirit of the law rather than the wording. Recently Karnataka government threatened to shout down over 4000 schools in and around Bangalore.
Reason: They have permit of running Kanada medium while they were actually teaching English medium.

1) If Government wants to promote Kananda, then it should open up more schools. Shutting down schools that are already running won’t promote Kanada in any form.
2) Since these schools were not getting any government grants (in fact they were paying huge sums for license etc.) State has no business in interfering with there proceedings (unless of course the education and facilities are sub-standard)
3) Majority of these schools lied in the suburban area, where people from lower middle class used to send their wards for quality education. So denying them English education might force the parents to shell out huge sums for the already few education.
4) There is a market for English medium schools so private schools cater to the niche. Closing these schools would only worsen the situation. Remember it will be the poor who will suffer, the rich will pay some donation and continue to send their kids to the choicest schools.
5) Do they want some kick-back to regularize these schools? More the controls, more inspector raj, more the corruption.

When will government realize that it has done a shoddy job in providing government sponsored primary schools to the masses? Subsidizing college education at the expense of primary education does not benefit the average Indian. Still 30-40% of the children have no access to schools.

Private schools are doing a great service by providing education without government having to spend a single penny (out of infamous educational cess). If you cannot assist them, then at least do not hamper their work.

well not free exactly, but definately most economical. Look at education:
1) Pre-school education: the best education of 2-4years kids is under the supervision of the mother or relatives (free nanies). But people spend 40 thousand a year to get their schools in all the fancy playschools. I often wonder is it for the kids, or for the pride and ego of the parents. I even heard of a theory which said that parents are so much pissed of from changing diapers and constant nagging that they are more than happy to dump their kids. One thing is true these playschools always charge more fees than any decent highschool or college. Probably because 3 year old are being taught about future technologies and being imparted skills which no college graduate can even dream of!

2) School education: If you look at school with best board results, theie fees are always affordable. While the school which is the most expensive always has below average results ( and many of them do not even impart education beyond 5th class) These expensive private schools will take admission interviews of a 3year old and their parents. What is it for, what purpose does it serve? I have no idea. But I have never met a person who aced in the primary school as well as in life.(discounting people from places where there was no compitition)

3) College education. The most wonderful thing I discovered recently was that ISB school of business charges more tution fee per month than any of the ivory business school. Comparing 2.4lakh charged by IIM for a 2 year course with 17lakhs charged by ISB for a 1 year course make the whole structure ridiculous, but ISB charges more fees than Stanford, California, Berkley and MIT. Also the school is only 4-5 years old and is still establishing itself, I shouldnot comment on the quality. But probably who can pay so high fees, already have big offices and father’s businesses to run. So they already might be at the top positions.

Even in graduation, I found fees at IIT were 16thousand per semester, while most of the private engineering colleges were safely charging upto 80 thousand per semester (with much less faculty, and facilities). Then for those who could not afford even this 16thousand, there were more scholarships than applicants. So if you fell in the merit cum means criteria, you will get a full tution fee waiver and a monthly stipend. For the rest there were affordable student loans, which banks were more than happy to lend. So good schools and college always ensure that you do not pay through the nose for education, and no bright student is denied education because of economic reasons.

Inspired by this, I thought of checking US schools, before generalizing. The top 20 schools(engineering and comerce) always have many times more scholarships, research assistanceship, tution fee waivers then the rest of the schools. Also the highest fees is always getting charged by the mediocre colleges. Call it a price of mediocricity, but next time if someone cribs about the expensive education, you might be safe to assume that he is not very bright.

Was there ever a glorious education system which India always boasts about?

Well ever wondered why we always mention about the glorious past, well agreed that the Vedas and Upanishads were master pieces at their time, but those were written in the early age of Aryan culture what was there after that? Takshila and Nalanda lay as ruins soon.

Dark Age of Indian education!

Propagators of Gurukul system seem to be very sure that teachers selected were of high caliber in knowledge and character. Well the reality is that there was no central authority controlling the appointment of teachers. There was no fixed syllabus.

Each and every person by virtue of being born as a Brahmin had an inherent right to be a teacher. He could open an ashram and take pupils as and when he likes, and he could give certificate of completion of studies as and when he chooses. He was not bound by any law of land nor any convention of teachers’ body. There used to be guilds and bodies of merchants and craftsmen, but I am unaware if some institution was established to supervise the teaching and conduct of the teacher in such gurukuls. Most of the gurukuls were single teacher residential ones free from any royal or academic control. What was the guarantee of quality under these circumstances? It is a matter of egotism, vanity and conceit to think of quality in such teaching institutions. These gurukuls had no respect in foreign lands and never attracted any foreign students.

Course Content

There seems to be misconceived idea that a student coming out from such a school had all the requisite qualities of a good citizen. This is far from the truth. He used to have learned by heart the Brahmanic sastras, which hardly make him versatile. He could never think of outside matters. What is not in his books does not exist for him. Al Biruni, for example, mentioned that Indian scholars have no knowledge of civilization abroad, and they disbelieve if somebody tells them about it. Their thought process centered on the rituals, vratas and ceremonies.

The Brahmanic knowledge consisted of recital of Vedas, without understanding the meaning of what is being recited, and was miles away from the actual life of productive castes. As a matter of fact, it was enjoined that the recites must not try to understand the meaning of what he reads.

The education was more centered around training some parrots who could sing than create some educated civilized citizens. Writing new books or literary texts, doing scientific study was never encouraged. The medium of instruction was Sanskrit which is a dead language of any value for the community.

Infact, there was no medium for scientific study till the 18th century. The educated class predominately used Sanskrit and Farsi. ( Haath kangan ko aarsi kya, padhe likhe ko farsi kya… meaning like you are not expected to need a mirror for the ornaments in your forearm, you are expected to know farsi if you call yourself educated)

Sanskrit was constructed in the poetic lines (where the stanzas need to by rhyming) which makes it tough for any recording work. The Hindi which we very proudly say as ours was never a written language. It was first written in a paragraph form ( like it is today) by British scholars in the 18th century.

And we blame British to ruin our education system.

One cannot stick for a couple of centuries with the same book in hand and say it is the ultimate source of all knowledge and is written by god himself. Like civilization even books need to evolve. Saying that this scientific discovery was already mentioned in so and so stanza of this ancient book is ridiculous. If you already knew about it then I would say… shame on you Vedic scholars. You are sitting on a gold mine of knowledge and have gained nothing from it.

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Chanakya’s views (Now writing as DeadManWalking)

I have heard about the glory of the upinishads and vedas since I was born. Everything we have now is already in the vedas. Recently a girl told me that we have had no progress in the field of medicines new in medicine thats not in ayurveda or ancient Chinese medicine! were her exact words. I dont know much but i definitely don’t think this is correct. I don’t believe penicillin is mentioned in the vedas is it ? Coming to the vedas its all about interpretation isn’t it. A shlok praising the sun god calculates the value of pi to huge number of decimal places. I don’t know Sanskrit but i found that to be awesome (i am not being sarcastic here).

Between Chinese and Indian aurveda a huge amount of knowledge is covered. However one still has to remember that we still have no cures for a huge number of diseases and we seem to be very apt at finding new ones. diseases which were not even there in ancient times definitely have no cure today. Oh yhea and cancer and radiology and tumors. Let me see the ancient method for tumor in the brain was to remove a part of the skull so that the pressure on the brain decreases (practiced in very few places most places would just kill off the person calling him crazy) . Nowadays i can choose to have my brain fried in case of tumor.

But medicine has not improved much over the ages. However the others parts of the medical world has improved. Surgery for example. We are so intent on glorifying our past that we tend to forget the present. the past is always perfect isn’t it? We keep on hearing about the great things being found in the vedas. The design of an aircraft for example, however within a few months of the claim there was no longer any more information about it. If the vedas are such a huge storehouse of knowledge then why hasn’t it all been brought out?? just random parts from people who disappear over the horizon.

The vedas have information there is no doubt about it. but what i don’t know and as far as i see no1 else really does except that they know its there.

As far as the ancient education system goes which denied every person the right to study. The immorality of it all is still beheld as being a great system by a majority of the country. Considering that even today the caste system is so prevalent in India i find it absolutely ridiculous. Not that our present system is any better, if you can afford it u can get education. What was initially being denied by virtue of caste is now being denied by virtue of cash. and lets not talk about the government mid day meal programs and its education effort. when the process will be able to lift a person from the downtrodden to reach one of the premier institutes of the country without reservations then ill say it has succeeded.

while i cannot comment about the course content of the gurukul system especially since i wasn’t there nor have i really seen anything other than in the serials and movies. If the vedas were that good i believe then all those stuff must have been imparted into the disciples by the gurus. But somehow it doesn’t look like it happened did it? were the teachers so righteous that they forgot to impart knowledge written in books ? or did the books come to be written at a time when all knowledge had been forgotten. But one thing is guaranteed the aim of an education system such that the knowledge is limited to a particular caste is bound to fail in one way or the another. if education in those times was how and why we are better than the person whom we have conquered in the past then no thanks i say. i cannot believe that we can stil think about that as being a great system of education

What was the essence of Gurukul Education?

Those who are fond of Gurukul education, know well its draw backs, but will not speak because of their vested interests. First thing gurukul was never open to the majority of masses. About 85 to 90 percent of population was outside the pale of Gurukuls. Only the 15 percent population was being catered by Gurukuls. That too, only the boys were admitted and not the girls, thus bringing the total possible population to be only about seven percent.

There were no criteria for admission apart from the caste and whims and fancies of the teacher. Examples of denial of admission to very meritorious candidates on the basis of caste are seen. Glaring example is of Eklavya. Not only the guru Dronacharya denied admission to Eklavya, but demanded Eklavya’s thumb as gurudakshina for education NOT imparted by him. Many people feel it is irony of fate and mockery of awards, that such a name is associated with highest sports awards in this country, without any protest from the sufferers of the system.

Second example is of Karna, who got admission to Parashurama’s class, which was exclusively reserved for the Brahmins, on false statement of caste. Benefit of his knowledge, labeled as unlawfully obtained, was withdrawal when his caste became known, which ultimately lead to his death.

Example of Satyakama Jabala is mentioned by many orthodox people to erroneously show that education in Upanishadic times was open to low caste people. This is a wrong inference drawn from his story. Satyakama was asked by his guru his caste. His mother sent a word to the guru that she did not know the exact father of the child as she had relations with many people. This frank statement, the guru declared, can only be a statement of a son of a Brahmin. So the admission to the gurukul was done on the basis of Brahmin caste. Not only that, the test applied by him, and his presumption of Brahmin caste, was derogatory to non-Brahmins, because it was his belief that only Brahmins could speak such a truth and non-Brahmins could not have uttered such truth. It may be noted that the declaration was made by the child’s mother, who had no right to education. How a bold statement by mother can decide the caste of putative father, is a mystery, nobody has ever talked about.