Ghost Lines (part II) ....

continued from Ghost Lines (part I) ....

I pick up 2 lines from the last part to begin with this one - "The Government is not the problem, the attitude is. By incorporating a Lokpal, will that attitude be resolved?"

Many have succumbed willingly or unwillingly to the lure of money across different political parties, societies and organizations; to the greed born out of selfishness and hence it is not a disease characterized by only one of the parties, but a problem at large. This problem has been bred over the decades and is not out of the blue that we are witnessing it - it was just the case that it was a mere ghost to us till now and many skeletons are dropping out of these cupboards. If there is a problem there has to be a reason for it and only by addressing the reason can it be solved.

If it is bred over so many decades, this government cant be the problem. They sure as hell have compounded the problem and supported it too, but they are not the root. Socrates had once said, "Give me the child for 7 years and neither the devil nor the angel can change him." Socrates speaks of what a child is taught when he/she can be receptive the most, learn the most, inculcate good/bad the most and change the most like the wet mud shaped by a potter. It is this primary shaping during the childhood which matters the most - the parents and the teachers are the potters for any child - it is the education a child has received which decides his character. If there is a flaw in the system of education, it is going to reflect in the child; and it is this decades-old education system which is spitting out the evils. The Lokpal will give us a law, will it teach us the attitude? No, it won't and it shouldn't too because that is the job of our education system to develop the right attitude in children so that as grown men and women, they be not afraid to be just and stand for the right cause and protect the liberty of this nation when and where required.

I remember a conversation with one of my friends a year back

(a cropped part of it) -

Him: What are your long term plans?

Me: I want to retire early from corporate life and join politics; if that does not work out, I want to be a teacher to 4th - 9th Std kids.

Him: (surprised) why?

Me : (here I explained all that I keep blogging about !!)

Him : Don't you think you are usurping the job opportunities of the less qualified by being a teacher in 4th-9th grade?

Me: (with deep sadness and pity) No; and one day you'l know why!

We left it there, I did not! Is this not the problem? Just because teaching attracts a low pay, how does it become a job for the less qualified? Teaching is one of the most difficult jobs and requires the best men at the mast and the perception has become exactly the opposite because of how it has been painted over the years; because of how the Governments of the past till the present have methodically extinguished bit by bit the culture of the nation from our textbooks; it is because they have started funneling the mass of students through a big damn funnel into the rat races of academics - Macaulay's address. Why do we disregard the fact that every child is different and has extreme potential in different fields - why can't we understand this and incorporate it? - like the US where all jobs have the same respect and no work is inferior; like China which has different schools dedicated to different sports helping them churn out the best sportsmen in different games eventually leading to a fat medal tally in the Olympics; like Russia which sees most schools with separate halls dedicated for chess resulting in Russia being home to the most grandmasters in chess !!

I had found the above pic and I was amazed by how a single pic can so accurately depict the sorry state of our education system; how accurately can it depict that our schools are not building happy futures but a dark future for a nation; how accurately can it depict the injustice meted out to these young minds - wings cut off before they can fly; neutered before they can dream and the bud nixed with precision and ruthlessness with the ulterior motive to subjugate the mass; make them man servants and robots who are insensitive to the nation's cause, towards the society; stamp out the sense of freedom, of justice and of compassion and mercy; engulf them in this unfair race for money and status fuelled by selfishness with any lack of remorse or regret.

With ineffective and inefficient administration of schools and education systems (on purpose; this aint a mistake - it is a well planned British ploy which "our leaders" failed to recognize then, abolish now), the Governments have been responsible for the rise of private coaching tutions who literally print money making education a business rather than a duty, an honour to shape lives, change them and inspire generations to come. They have been responsible to set up this parallel system giving birth to demons feeding on the fear of students and their parents. (coaching for professional exams can be understood and accepted, not this - not for primary, secondary and graduate school syllabus) Yes, I have had reports about some professional coaching institutes focussing on raw concepts but most of them train students to earn marks, few ever teach them the underlying concepts; few ever inculcate the habit to ask "why?"; few ever encourage out-of-box and creative thinking - the system and the tutions, kill the child within; some survive, many are unfortunate. Each and every step is the cause to a "who cares" and insensitive attitude which is being bred. This insensitivity, this failure to grasp the basic fact that we owe something back to the nation, to the society - these cause (education system) and effect (attitude) dynamics have led to a complete disruption of our systems and put us politically and socially in a place we find very hard to get out of. This attitude has spread like a virus and has infected our very air, our very surrounding - our own governors, our own administrators.

This is the link I see - the Ghost Line; governments will come and go, Lokpals will come and go, men will come and go - what about the attitude? It has become deep-rooted and after these two blog posts, do you as a reader believe that the Lokpal will give us the solution we seek? We need a solution which is free of attachment, is a self-sufficient process once mechanized and implemented.

"If you find a solution and become attached to it, the solution will become your next problem."

Bhagavad Geeta

I hope all the readers have a great 31st December as we move across into 2012. May the new year bring in more challenges, test us hard and give us the strength to be better at passing moments; Await the concluding part, "Ghost Lines (part III) ...." on 7th Jan 2012, till then ....

Jai Hind !