Editor
I write to express my absolute horror that little girls are being raped and killed in India today — the most recent case being that of Chittorgarh, Rajastan, where an adult male raped a three-year old girl, then strangled and killed her, finally throwing her little body into a well. Where is the national uproar that is appropriate for crimes of this order? The whole nation should shut down for a day or two, to mourn the victim and protest such heinous crimes. The death penalty cannot resolve such crimes. Instead, culprits should be imprisoned for life and forced to serve women for the rest of their lives. Where is the hue and cry (nationwide) for raising boys differently? This cry should come from men, more than women. Men should be horrified at what members of their gender have degenerated to — something worse than animals. What kind of an adult male is so devoid of paternal feelings that he rapes a three-year old girl? Yes, we are speaking of a toddler here — a three-year old! This is no ordinary lust. I am flummoxed for an answer. How are Indian mothers raising their sons these days? Are they still pampering them, as they did generations ago? What about fathers?
I also write to express my support for Salil Gewali’s protest of a recent Supreme Court decision to commute the death sentence of a rapist who raped and murdered another little girl in 2013. While I am, in principle, against the death penalty, commuting this penalty sporadically makes no sense. Either remove it altogether, or apply it with justice. If excessive punishment destroys justice, so does inadequate punishment.
Yours etc.,
Deepa Majumdar,
Via email
Playing with students’ lives
Editor,
The Higher Secondary School result is the most valuable milestone in a student’s life. It opens up opportunities to the world of Humanities and Science and Technology. Everything was fine until Covid 19 created havoc in education. But had we stuck to old methods of examination, the descriptive format, it would have not reached this sorry unperceivable, unacceptable 100 % cut off marks for undergraduate aspirants. Descriptive format has a paper setter of long experience, board of moderators of much more experience, with one requirement- to be tight- lipped after the questions are set. Our poorly paid evaluators spend sleepless nights, meticulously going through each line to deliver justice as far as possible, also fully conscious of the fact that one might lose face should the examinee appeal for re-evaluation.
With multiple choice questions (MCQs) we have only a paper setter who would throw the correct ticks to evaluators who never bother to cross check but they are heavily paid. So the outcome is many got 720/720 as in NEET. Hope they would get 100% in the final MBBS too. After 2025, these MBBS would be put to the real test.
This 100%cut-off had pushed the UGC to frame the Common Universities Entrance Test (CUET). Immediately after three experts – Dr Sudha Acharya Chairperson of National Progressive Schools Conference, Dr Abhi Dev Habib, and Dr Rajesh Thapa both Professors of Delhi University expressed their concern about CUET as students passing out of the ICSE Board would be disadvantaged. More so the students of rural areas. Indeed, no one really ever bothers about students in rural areas that cannot afford coaching and most are computer illiterate. Hence such students are deprived of many of the benefits enjoyed by their urban peers.
Dr Thapa was shocked at the hurry with which CUET was to be implemented. The National Testing Agency (NTA) immediately jumped in to offer coaching to school students who could afford to pay capitation fees that are slightly less than that of NEET coaching, the minimum of which is around Rs 6 lakhs per year. Is this fair to all?
And since NEET was imposed since 2019, our toppers could no longer become doctors. They are reconciled to the other sciences while many switched to Arts. The affluent proceeded to Delhi or Rajasthan and managed to qualify this year. Let me predict that CUET is no different from NEET.
To understand the predicament of the NEET, IIT and JEE aspirants, Dr Habib slammed NTA for its MCQs which are trick MCQs discovered only in those made easy guide books. In 2020, 2021 NEET, in Physics, out of 44 MCQs only one in each year were from Class 11 CBSE. The rest are memorisation of conversion tables and formulae with lengthy arithmetic that consume time so much so that students had no time to clean the glasses that had gone foggy due to their masks. Dr Habib did mention that education is in concurrent list of the Constitution by which Education vests on both the Centre and states. In other words the Centre has no right to bulldoze the states.
Dr Dinesh Singh ex VC of DU lamented at the toppers of IIT and NEET, who miserably fail in International examinations. This means that the way MCQs are set in India lacks creativity and conceptual clarity.
I was deeply shocked when a few days after the UGC floated CUET to all states to study if they were going to implement it, NEHU had already decided to go ahead with it. How can a policy on which rests the future of our students be so hurriedly executed? This proves that NEHU does not care about the fate of our students.
The Director of Public Relations, NEHU, David Pyngrope, claimed that there was consensus over the decision, but the fact that two principals expressed grave concern proves that it was not so. Two principals, namely RM Manih of UCC and RK Lyngdoh of Synod College, expressed dissent fearing that rural students would be the most disadvantaged.
Already the CBSE students of Class 12 are confused with examinations just a few weeks away. They rue that the most valuable exam is no longer considered necessary to get admission to undergraduate colleges with the imposition of s CUET. It also means all their efforts from KG to Class 12 have gone in vain.So why should they put their best foot forward to pass their Class 12 exams? There is a commotion of filling up 4 forms which is a nightmare for those that are technologically challenged.
One problem we Indians have is that we dare not challenge what the UGC decides for us. UGC is not error free. In the past there was enticement to acquire a doctorate to enjoy a 3 year increment. This has devastated our students because selected teachers of colleges were given leave to pursue their M. Phil and doctorate. They only needed to find a local substitute. Naturally students bunked classes. After 5 years, the teacher would reappear with a doctorate but the students learnt nothing. In 1978, this was pointed out to UGC but it never bothered. It was only in 2000, that the National Eligibility Test (NET) became compulsory and teaching improved by leaps and bounds.
In a recent TV discussion, the UGC Chairman had nothing to say in defence of CUET except to say the UK and USA follow the same entrance procedure. In those countries there is universality of curriculum and textbooks are latest and strictly prescribed. And look at the syllabus omissions today in CBSE of topics on Mughals, the Cold War and poems of Faiz Ahmed Faiz. Subjects of current importance such as climate change, electronics, and vocational subjects that help get employment are missing. And except linguistics, the medium of instruction is English but this seems to have lost momentum after Hindi is given pride of place.
In Meghalaya, for example, Physics is taught only in one college since 1982 hence only students of that college have an advantage. Till 2022, NEHU is yet to have Physics at the Post Graduate level. Many students shift to Jadavpur and Calcutta University. Our state has no vision for education. We just copy others without proper weightage of our capacity.
What’s worse is that Education Minister, L. Rymbui first stated that CUET would disadvantage our students and then did a 180 degree turnaround. Look at the number of advertisements on television all selling education. Some sage has rightly stated, ” A time will come, when life and education are the stuff money can buy; the rich will become over-educated and prosper, and the poor drown in the sea of unemployment “
Yours etc
W. Passah
Ex HOD Electronics,
St Edmunds College Shillong