Cumulative effect of decades of neglect on India’s education system  

Macaulay is primarily at the root of the rotting of our age-old, value-based traditional oriental educational system by the British colonial education framework since 1835. Added to this is the gradual degradation of our social values and sense of responsibility, wherein most of us, including those in authority, failed in civic duties towards preserving our rich education system and learnings.  

There have been flaws and shortcomings to start with in our education system during the evolution period post-Independence, but we cannot blame successive governments for everything turning wrong, as actions on the ground to reshape and maintain Indian education had to be executed by countrymen and governments jointly.  

Each one of us is duty-bound to protect and promote our culture, including a high value-based education system. However, even those in authority failed to monitor and control ground-level execution to check wrong practices and learnings gradually seeping into the system. These had been the system’s biggest challenges and failures, as most citizens became part of or remained unconcerned about gradual transformative deterioration.  

Education became a business, with sharp divisions between the elite and deprived. Equal study patterns and facilities in all schools of learning should have been ensured at least till high school levels in free India to start with.  

Education mafias grew unchecked, with mushrooming, fully money-mongering private schools and coaching houses. Most of us did realise the same, but almost none dared to oppose or expose them for personal or otherwise reasons, resulting in the present state of distorted, unemployable education and rotten testing/examination systems. What society faces today on the education front, therefore, is the compounding effect of years of neglect and unconcern.  

Rotting testing systems  

This hits deep and hardest, as also most shameful and dreaded to us all as a society. Consequent to months of dedicated hard work, a competitor or student is faced with bashing news of a testing system plagued with malpractices, like paper leaks, mass copying or flaws in question papers, etc. These indeed would be most disheartening and intimidating to our hardworking, talented youth.  

And those resorting to such shameful acts are very much part of our own society; namely, the paper setters, examiners, facilitators of mass copying, etc.; mostly well-educated, hand-in-glove with habitual offenders for long.  

In fact, most of us also, at times, act as a smooth conduit to such practices, directly or indirectly; through direct indulgence, turning a blind eye to such persons or practices or, above all, non-enforcement of exemplary capital punishments by concerned authorities, like life imprisonment or death penalties. These are heinous crimes to be met with befitting punishments. Most feel provisions of revised punishments enforced recently are too weak to check seasoned offenders. The end losers being the aspiring youth all through.  

The overhauling  

Problem needs to be tackled en bloc and not in piecemeal, as the rotting has been compounding for decades. No instant or quick-fix solutions, but those based on well-brainstormed processes by honest, experienced experts.  

Most ironic fact remains that under almost similar conditions and environment, UPSC examinations are held flawlessly for years in succession for numerous central government services. All concerned need to study and adopt similar norms and procedures on an urgent basis for other examinations/tests too.  

Competitors and students’ agitation with flaming annoyance is genuinely understandable, but not the joining of anti-social elements and serious offenders. It is only the toad under the harrow that knows where it pinches him the most. So is the pain of our affected youth, which needs to be understood and remedied as priority.  

Things will improve, as most are honest, accountable, and responsive, but for a few with criminal mindsets without any sense of responsibility towards future generations or pride in society and the nation.  

Enough is enough. We can’t fail our youth for our ignorances and incapabilities. However, at this crucial stage of navigating the nation to ‘Viksit Bharat’ in the next two decades, we need to initiate the following actions:  

Institutionalise an education system embraced with global quality and employable skills. NEP-2020 is a definite futuristic step in this direction but needs revisiting in view of recent revelations and lessons learnt. While higher academics be open to only the real deserving and keen, employable skills for all be available through effective “Skill Universities”. Also, we need to put quality education on an equal pedestal for all through special attention to improving the pitiable conditions of schools in rural areas, both infrastructure- and quality-wise.  

Evolve a resilient, reliable and robust “Testing and Selection” system on the lines of UPSC, with strongest punitive actions to ensure zero tolerance towards education mafias and anti-national elements.  

And above all, high time to invoke our ardent civic senses and dutifulness towards society, as also the ‘awareness’ of happenings around us.  

Finally, the government has provided a free hand to specialised task forces instituted for the above purposes. They should act as future builders and caretakers of our aspiring youth, Gen A and Z inclusive, who will be in harness in the next two decades and beyond. 

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