Indians have brains. This news has spread by now. I read about an Indian girl in a school in U.S. who complained that her American peers expected her to excel simply because she was Indian. There are statistics which show that NRIs in U.S. are doing exceptionally well, that their percentage in organizations like NASA or Microsoft is far above average.
I used to think that the Indian education system has something to do with it. But recently I realized that Indians are brainy and successful in spite of their education. This may be too much of a generalization. There are hopefully many institutes with good curricula and excellent faculty, especially in science and technology. Yet one thing is certain: general education in India can do with improvement, and urgently so.
A few years ago I looked for the first time into a textbook of a 5 year old. He was learning rhymes and I was shocked: “LondonBridge is falling down, falling down, my fair Lady…” he learnt. Meanwhile he is eight and he still knows the rhyme. Good memory. But couldn’t it have been used for something better? Recently he learnt Roman numbers: X, C, L etc. I told him that he won’t need them, as Indians have came up with the far superior decimal system which is in use all over the world. He stunned me with his reply: “But it is GK (general knowledge), no?”
It struck me that GK is very much dictated by the west. What about knowing what ‘prananyama’ means? My laptop makes a red line underneath. It never heard of this word. My sister once told me that the one million Euro question in the German version of ‘Kaun banega crorepati?’ was: ‘Who accompanied Edmund Hillary to Mount Everest?’ The organizers were probably certain that Germans had never heard that name. Yet was it not Sherpa Tenzing Norgay who made it possible for Hillary to reach the top and take all the laurels?
A few days ago I looked into the notes of a Bachelor of Science student. She was preparing for a psychology test. It was again a shock: she had copied 7 ½ pages on Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytical theory of personality development. She learnt about oral, anal, phallic, genital stages, about Oedipus complex, etc. Nobody told her that this theory is outdated. Simply because Sigmund Freud, for whatever reason, is a famous name, the students have to lap it all up. Of course there were more theories for her to learn: by Carl Jung (who by the way fell out with Freud and visited India in 1938), Skinner, Maslow, etc. Not a single Indian was mentioned in her notes. Yet German students hear of the Bhagavad-Gita. Incidentally I myself was asked to write a chapter on the Yoga of the Bhagavad-Gita for a university reader meant for German psychology students which was published in 1989. In the 1970s at the height of the India wave in the west, a new stream was added to the existing therapies in western psychology. It was called ‘Transpersonal Psychotherapy’ and as the name suggests, postulates the reality of something that transcends the person. Ever heard of Atman? Some prominent representatives of this line like Stanislaw and Christina Groff had Indian gurus. I doubt, however, that the Indian contribution is getting acknowledged in their work.
It is amazing that Indians still don’t have the confidence to stand by their own wisdom. Are they not aware that Indian ancient scriptures are an amazing source of knowledge about the human being? Writings of a Swami Vivekananda or a Sri Aurobindo easily outshine western notions on personality. Are not at least some of those who design the curricula aware of it? It seems that only when it is very obvious that the west appreciates something Indian, will Indians also appreciate.
For example now, since Hollywood is interested in making a film on Ramayana and Indian mythology is becoming a hit in the West and of course exploited economically, Indian children (and adults), too, hear more about their mythology. Or now, since yoga is taught even in educational institutions in the west, there is at least a chance that yoga will be taught in Indian schools, as well.
It occasionally happened at some get together here in Dehradun that somebody quoted Shakespeare and expected me to know the passage. It is considered a sign of being highly educated. I have no knowledge of English literature. Our focus in school was on German literature. Incidentally, famous German writers like Hesse, Heine, Herder, Rilke, Jean Paul, Novalis, Schopenhauer and others read Indian scriptures and were influenced by them. Most of them had never been to India, but they appreciated the spiritual value of the Upanishads and the Bhagavad-Gita. Some clearly expressed that wider knowledge of Indian wisdom would make the west aware of the ‘colossal one-sidedness’ in which ‘our whole religious and philosophical thought is stuck’ (Prof. Paul Deussen in 1920).
Back to being educated. It is common knowledge that the British colonial masters intended to subdue India with the help of their education system and it worked. What prevents India from radically changing this system for the better 60 years after independence? Since Indians no doubt are brainy, they could easily come up with a better idea how to use those 12 or more years of education and not just copy the so called ‘first world’. Why are today’s Indians still so proud of having been educated at a convent? Why should Indians learn about Freud? Because Freud is general knowledge and Indian wisdom is not? Because it may come in some TV quiz? Because at some dinner party one may be considered highly educated? It certainly is odd.
A lot is done regarding child labour, laws are put in place, etc., yet school kids don’t get any protection from being overworked? Their working day often starts at 6 a.m. if not earlier with tuition even in winter and they have to cram their brains with often unnecessary stuff for many hours a day and their parents don’t even realize. This non stop slogging under pressure to pass the exams, takes its toll.
Once I was in an auto in Delhi. At a red light, it came to a halt right next to a Maruti van full of school kids. I bent and looked at them from my auto till the green signal came. Not one of them discovered me. They all silently stared straight ahead, maybe lost in thoughts, or maybe simply dead tired.
That’s when I felt that street kids are more alive, present in the moment and aware. They generally don’t lack in self esteem and know more about psychology and life skills than most B.Sc. students. Yet in all likelihood “a BA” or “a B.Sc.” or “a PhD” will feel infinitely superior to them. Does anyone know why?
by Maria Wirth
45 Comments
Present indian education is what the former masters are propagating through their servants who are ruling India now. India is not being ruled by Indians. Please look up youtube dot com for India on lease for 99 years by Rajiv Dixit.
Pranaams Maria-ji!
Your points are very very pertinent. You echo a lot of our angst.. that we missed out… and our Indian children are continuing to miss out on their own treasures… their mother tongues and the living cultures around them due to a British-foisted education model… and which we have lazily continued to live with and give only cosmetic touch-ups. Yes, we have to do things afresh in our education system. Thanks again for a clear set of points.
Dear Maria
May God bless you
there is a great demand among the poor and middle class in India to give their children an english medium education because they see it as a doorway to a better life, a white collar
job in a city and so on. As a consequence of this attitude they look down on Indian language study and culture. However, there are schools which promote Indian values for instance, the
Vivekananda Shetty group of schools in Chennai has Sanskrit as one of the compulsory
subjects. The Sathya Sai Education System lays great emphasis on character development
and value based education. for more info pl visit : http://www.sssieducare.org/
What prevents India from radically changing the colonial educational system in the last 60 years of post Independence period ? How come no one seems to be paying attention to the fact that , for the very same six decades , only Nehru family has ruled the country under fake and hidden agendas , and that the dynastic family is descendents of Mughals — that a deep conspiracy between The British and the Mughals to keep India subjugated has been in place .Were not Francis Drake and Macauley , sent out for that very purpose ??? Please correct me if i am wrong Am willing to be educated in True History . Thank you very much Ms Wirth , for understanding us Indians and our mauled and mutilated self worth .
Thank you for your compassionate, sensible and knowledgeable articles. Today, some really welloff folks are sending kids to gurukuls, like those run on Rishi Prabhakar’s principles. These rich children will be fluent in Hindi and English, in various trades and skilled enough to enjoy life anywhere. Poorer children, educated in third rate ‘English medium’ schools will, alas, find that they are far behind those who know Hindi and who will influence / command more people. To be a film star, an IAS officer or a politician, fluent Hindi is a must! English is one of the hardest languages to learn without determined teachers and fluent parents. I think ONE percent of India is fluent in English and this lot has been educated to aspire to work for some western institution (whose profits go to the west). It is 5% if you include any type of English.
Entrepreneurs, engineers and technical folk usually come from the non English educated as their schools emphasize maths and science rather than English literature and style.
If you know Sanskrit, you can follow all northern dialects (as these are dialects not separate languages) and many, many words in the south. Sinhala too can be understood right away. Many words are merely pronounced differently. Urdu too is Sanskrit based for it has mostly Hindi words and grammar.
Maria you have observed it right and the way todays child lost their innocence to this system were aptly shown in examples and now only way forward is to delearn all this crap and relearn the basic what i personally doing nower days to establish the fundamentals of indian philosophy in society.
thank you for sharing your thoughts in blog it gives shot in the arms to individuals like me who are going through this cyle of delearn and learning the truth.
‘It is amazing that Indians still don’t have the confidence to stand by their own wisdom’ – a sweeping generalisation. True, due to Nehruvian policies and marxist-‘secularist’ emphasis – curriculum was distorted. The very strong message of Sri Aurobindo – especially in his early writings in ‘Karma Yogin’ and ‘Bande Mataram’ need to part of a national education. There is a resurgence that is now surfacing again – it was always there. https://auronation.wordpress.com
In my opinion the question is more about the time being wasted in learning unwanted and unuseful stuff than about learning Sanskrit or any other language. There are too many restrictions in schools, some imposed by the respective boards like CBSE, ICSE, etc and other due to mindless competition among schools (without any common sense). Why do teachers ask children make charts of wild animals, domestic animals as though it really matters or helps them? It is the parents who go through internet, print, paste and send this because the children (say UKG, 1st standard) cannot do this. Why are the parents kept busy? Do the teachers also have no common sense or are they just blind-imitators of the school?
If children of different languages are allowed to play among themselves I am sure every child will learn to atleast speak in a understandable way every language – there is no necessity to be perfect. It is also not so much necessary that every child learns to read all languages and it is all the more not necessary for a child to learn to write in all languages. children depending on their capacity will naturally learn to speak as many languages as they are capable of, with some tutoring based on the interest read as many languages as they are capable of and also write as many languages as they are capable of. I still do not understand why there is a restriction of 3 languages and why there is a necessity to read and write all 3.
Why should every child compulsorily learn all subjects upto 12th? Some children may be weak in maths but good in something else. Why should such children be made to struggle to get good marks. Is this not waste of time?
The amount of effort, time and money saved can be better utilized for something better for the child, the parents, the teachers and the society at large.
beautiful…
Your analysis boils down to- “Education at all level- to be an effective tool for socio-economic development of a given nation must be in mother tongue”. Education in indigenous language to be effective and sustainable must be linked to the means of livelihood. Knowledge of mother tongue must allow one to earn a decent living as it is in Germany and other European countries.
If you know of any Indian organization working on the same principle you may refer them to me.
(www.sjsm.org) (www.hrdsinc.org) (www.onthewaytodenmark.com) for collaboration and support.
Good article just hit the blog today and read it.. and if I may add my views though its couple of years old blog but the issue is still relevant and given the change in the power this article is food for thought!!! Great work keep it up!!!! You may want to revisit say 4-5 years later and redo the maths to see the changes for good!!! I trust
Anyways going back to your article you have nailed the current landscape of misconceptions, identify crisis etc and you have rightly identified that we have in the past 500 years and more importantly in the past 65 years we have forgotten our roots(not lost it yet) and have become a land of producing workers(intelligent) and I guess the current state of affairs in india is due to
– India was ruled by outsiders for more than 300-400 years during which the rulers ensured destroying the indigenous culture, education system, religious practices and spread religious/political corruption. Though it got independent from British till date it was nothing but an independent colony not a country run by political party leaning towards raj rulers, suppression of local cultural practices, beliefs, educational system etc., were still rampant during the Nehruvian dynasty rule. These had great impact on the people and hence in the generations post so called independence were lost. Education was just literacy for people to become workers to survive. True education which were practiced earlier to the invasion of the outsiders, was lost. The education system was an all-round one with areas of studies included- science, spirituality, economics, astronomy/cosmology, agriculture, occult science etc.. all of these were destroyed in the 300-400 years of external rule.
As Bakula in the above thread rightly pointed out a theory which may be true to a large extent that mughal/british are ensuring the country is in chaotic condition in all aspects..but I feel they have failed to eradicate the DNA of indian culture or the spiritual knowledge, as we feel the emergence of our roots nurtured once again..
As Mark Twain said that ‘India is the cradle of mankind’ he did not make this statement to appease but to emphasise the fact that human race as one can be benefitted with indian practices(spiritual, mind/body, practical education- gurukul based, etc) minus the religious connotation. Get the best practices from old civilisations like China, Peru, Mexican etc which will help build a robust society
NOTE: I believe this will continue for India, if there is no unity amongst the people, outsiders will continue to abuse and take advantage. We still have a long way to go as such the blunt truth is regional political abuse has led to identifying ourselves as south indian / north indian or madrasi, punjabi, bong, mallu, marati, etc., the day we identify ourselves as indians then you will see a different india- which is happening as we talk. Point to ponder for all Indians..
In the bigger picture, my view is we, when I say we it includes the whole human race on the earth to first accept and believe that we are Human beings then comes country etc., if this is achieved then we will not have these conflicts, terrorism, suppression, power hungry nations will disappear.. Its all about power over others which gives temporary elated feeling which becomes obsession to see militants, corrupt govts etc.,growing and expanding. Having faith that the day will come when we realise we are all inter-connected and are a strand in the so called Human Fabric. Point to ponder for all of us as Human Beings..
Education should be an all round practice(not a system) and definitely not the current way of creating human robots..for generating wealth, workers for the crony capitalists etc. We are Human Beings and not Human Doings!!!!
Finally, my view is that the Children should be given the choice of choosing her or his stream of studies or sports or activities etc where he or she excels and enjoys!!! PASSION based customised education system(not literacy) will only bring about a change across societies..which i am not sure will happen in the next hundred years to come!!! Wake up call for all parents and would be parents across the world to inculcate and help their children to identify their passion or talent which is unique to them!!! This will create a peaceful society.
Let the child in everyone be alive irrespective age, rage, gender etc., then we will ensure blissful living, innovative thinking and in the process eradicate war, greed, crony capitalism, etc.,
Great Work Maria will browse your other articles as well !!!
these two are also on education
https://mariawirthblog.wordpress.com/2013/01/03/education-in-india-part-2-how-to-improve-it/
https://mariawirthblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/11/decolonising-indias-education/
thanks for your comment
Great Blog.
This is a valid concern for parents teacher and society as a whole that how western influence are leveraging education system in India, it should be balance approach when it comes to child’s future on larger scale. At the same time parents and teachers should also encourage and support their children in early stages of their lives that what they want to learn and how they want to expand their horizon in global marketplace with right knowledge, skills and open mindedness.
Best wishes,
Thank you for sharing.
an excellent article, one that needs to be read by every Indian, especially by those who make policy decisions related to education. whenever concerned people try to oppose this “cultural Apartheid”, there are strong reactions from vested interests.
Recently, an article appeared in an online magazine, whose link is below:
http://www.caravanmagazine.in/vantage/india-headed-towards-simplification-its-history-gopinath-ravindran
In response, I wrote an article which I am pasting below:
Mr. Ravindran speaks of Yoga, Ayurveda, and Vedic Astrology as if they are some kind of disease.
A friend of mine is Professor and Head of the Department of Sanskrit at a major U.S. University, and a world renowned Indologist. He is a white Caucasian American. He told me something interesting,”The study of Indology was commissioned by the early colonials with an explicitly stated and recorded two point agenda: 1) to prove to the Indians that we, the Christian Europeans, are superior, 2) to understand the Indians better so that they could be controlled effectively.
The resulting body of knowledge about India, its History and culture, philosophy and its sciences, is undeniably euro-centric, prejudiced, tampered, altered, and contains too many instances of willful omissions, commissions, disinformation, lies, half-truths all cleverly engineered to fulfill the two prime directives outlined above.
Unfortunately this same body of knowledge is taught in Indian Schools to this day. As an example, Mr. Ravindran, I urge you to spend 50 rupees and go out and buy a copy of the History Textbook for grade 7 for the ICSC syllabus, taught in thousands of convent schools in India TODAY. Please, open the chapter on “History of South India”. I have it open in front of me right now. Here is what it says, I am faithfully copying:
“RELIGION: The doctrines of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism were known in the South. HOWEVER, THESE WERE NOT POPULAR RELIGIONS. Most people worshiped their local gods and goddesses. Murugan, known as Kartikeya or Skanda in the North, was the most popular god of the Tamil People. He was the god of War. SACRIFICES WERE MADE TO PLEASE HIM. Many people living in the coastal areas worshipped sea gods. brave warrirors who died fighting were also worshipped”.
After this, there is a long paragraph titled: “Christianity in India”: ….was a religion which originated in West Asia and was preached by Jesus Christ. He emphasized that Human beings were a creation of God and GOD LOVED THEM. When a person dies, the soul goes to heaven and becomes reunited with God. SINCE CHRISTIANITY WAS A SIMPLE RELIGION, IT ATTRACTED MANY FOLLOWERS. CHRISTIAN PREACHERS CAME TO SOUTH INDIA AND CHRISTIANITY FIRST SPREAD AMONG THE PEOPLE OF THE MALABAR COAST.BY SEVENTH CENTURY AD, THERE WERE CHRISTIAN INDIAN COMMUNITES LIVING IN KERALA.”
Now, Mr. Ravindran, do you agree with this historical assessment of South India? The message is clear and not very subtle: South India and its people were worshipping some primitive, tribal god of War (the textbook has the capital ‘W’), doing horrible animal sacrifices, and were, thankfully, civilized by the Christian missionaries who taught them about the true God (with a capital G), love and everlasting peace in Heaven.
There is no mention of the sublime literature of Tyagaraja, Purandardas, Dikshitar, Adi Shankara, the sublime philosophy of Ramamujacharya. The Grand and exquisite architecture of its many temples. The mathematicians, the philosophers, the classical art forms of dance and music and painting and sculpture. Do you really believe that, in the past, Sanatan Dharma, Jainism and Buddhism were minority religions, and that learning and civilization and humanity and love and compassion were “brought” to South India, very graciously, buy St. Thomas and his missionaries.
Well, Mr. Ravindran, I have a serious objection to such negative indoctrination, and if I raise my voice, I am immediately judged by you and your colleagues to be a BJP, RSS, Hindutva, Saffron Brigade guy. The picture I have outlined above is just the tip of the iceberg. There needs to be a long, sustained and intelligent review of not only History, but many other subjects taught in Indian schools and Universities. Mr. Ravindran, you and Romilla Thappar and your ilk have done more than your share of damage to this beautiful land. It is time you took your silk ties and suits, your polished leather boots, your golf clubs and your IIC membership cards, your clipped oxford accents and your hatred for India and things Indian, and move to a western country, where you can happily spend the remainder of your life, blissfully sitting at the feet of your colonial masters.
Every Indian should read this.
Thank you Madam for bringing this issue on the table. Thank you once again.
My 2 cents here. I believe that Indian education system should emphasize the best of Indian achievements, Indian paradigms, while also appreciating many Western inventions.
Right now, sadly, in India we find two kinds of creatures. One, who believe adamantly that ancient Hinduism was the greatest and all the ‘western’ science and technology is useless. They use mobile phones, facebook and all the western inventions from safety pin to cars, but still refuse to accept the impact of Western science and technology.
The other type of creature is the one who refuses to see any value of Indian traditions, science, technology and have total contempt for Indian traditions, which are far more empathetic, far more spiritual than many of the western concepts. Using simple analogies and thought processes, Indian thinking capture simple realities. However, the west does not want to appreciate Indian thinking because of two reasons. Firstly the Indian thinkers are often directly intuitive about reality and hardly use the inferior logical reasoning method to arrive at reality. Secondly very often, they find the Indian thought process was much superior and/or came before similar Western ideas. For example, during the period when Moses was receiving the rules of behaviour and ‘dos and don’ts’ in the form of ten commandments, Indian thought was already contemplating on much deeper issues such as the nature of the mind and so on.
So these western scholars neatly compartmentalise Indian thoughts into a separate box called ‘Eastern philosophy’ or ‘Indian philosophy’ or ‘Hindu philosophy’ so that many Indian ideas do not come to the mainstream. For example, the great Indian thinker Chanakya existed much before Machiavelli and his thoughts are varied and profound. Yet in the mainstream political science departments in UK/US etc. Chanakya is rarely taught or talked about.
This is, in my opinion, a kind of academic apartheid mindset. On the other hand, in India itself, due to British influence on education, most Indians keep repeating what is often printed or written in other Western countries, without sufficient knowledge of deeper Indian comparable traditions.
So we need an India which has academics who appreciate both the Western thoughts and ideas which have come out in the recent centuries, which often validate the ancient Indian thought process. Of course, we do not need scholars who compulsively hate the Western ideas because hatred of West or Islam is certainly not genuine Hinduism. I call these organisations which spread hatred against West, Islam or Christianity as ‘pseudo-Hindu’ organisations, because true Hinduism always believed in one global family, ‘vasudev kutumbakam’.
However, we also do not need scholars who love the Western ideas and condemn everything which originates in India. They would only accept something which has originated in the West. This mindset is a slavish pre-colonical mindset and the faster that Indians get out of this mind-set, the better it is for India and the world.
‘@Dr. Krishna Kant Shukla,
While I agree with your arguments (please read my comment also), I disagree with you asking people (for eg. Ravindran/Thapar) who have other views to leave the country. That is a typical Sanghi kind of fascism. In a true democracy, even those who disagree or even dislike India should have the same rights as the others who love India (of course, as long as they do not indulge in or encourage violence against others). Even in America or UK there are people who live in UK/America but dislike UK/America, yet America or UK does not take away their right to live, share their views or disseminate their arguments. This kind of ‘if you do not love certain ideas about India, you should not live here’ is a kind of fascist thinking, which I call ‘pseudo-Hinduism’. Genuine Hinduism is liberal and believes that even critics have the right to remain under the shadow of India. When the dhobi criticised Sita, Lord Ram is not said to have killed the dhobi or punished him.
Great article, Maria! You certainly bring up very relevant points. Our Indian education badly needs a fresh new approach, a de-colonized mindset, an Indianized philosophical approach, right from the conception of the aims of education.
Perhaps some readers of your blog might be interested in reading this review of a book I recently wrote about bringing some of the Indian spirit back into Indian Education. I raise many similar points in the book. The review can be read here – https://matriwords.wordpress.com/2015/07/01/book-review-abcs-of-indian-national-education-prof-kittu-reddy/
More about the book can be read here – https://matriwords.wordpress.com/abcs-of-indian-national-education/
Thanks for writing this piece! I have been exploring and enjoying many of your other writings also on this blog.
Great article Dr. Krishna Kant Shukla ji. Anyone who speaks and writes their conscience is immediately judged and branded by the paid slave media and blacked out completely. Today’s Hindu kids do not even know that there is a Bhagavad Gita or a Ramayana as there is absolutely no mention of these in any text books (CBSE or state or ICSE), even if there is, as you said it is a passing demeaning reference. If samaskritham is introduced even as an optional subject replacing or as an add-on to German, it is condemned and forced to take back. What do we not have in our ancient text – it contains everything and much more advanced than any science in the most advanced countries. But there are no takers due to this kind of brain washing. I hope people read article like yours and get back to their roots at least by taking baby steps to start with. Let the mahaans blessings be with you and your family sir.
I hope the present Govt has the gumption and strength to carry on with this task and complete it. For long the anti India/Hindu governments that “administered” India had vested interests and therefore ignore this important aspect.
Good to know that many persons work towards decolonising Indian education.
however, i feel the language issue is also an important point. those who are fully fluent in English hardly can imagine how one can not be fluent… but 99,9 % of Indians (and i guess 99.99% in Europe except Britain) are not fluent.
It took me 20 years reading and talking mainly in English to get the confidence to write in English – and German is closer to English than Indian languages. It’s a disaster for the kids and for India when kids from families with no English knowledge are sent to English Medium school which unfortunately had ;become fashionable in the last 10 years and still is.
here is my article on this issue
https://mariawirthblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/11/decolonising-indias-education/
Excellent article, as always.
Re. “What about knowing what ‘prananyama’ means? My laptop makes a red line underneath.”
No wonder! Correctly written is: Pranayama’!
🙂
I hope PM.Modi reads your article and does something about the Indian education system.
I fully appreciate the facts mentioned here by author. What a live and intellectuals observations about Indian brain. My son is dam active kid but I find him under pressure or reluctant in every morning when I asked him to go to school to recite Bible verse and “merry had a little lamb” He is quite confident and good in calculations…common sense and science stuff but feels less energy when it comes to study languages [London bridge is falling down]
did you see
https://mariawirthblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/11/decolonising-indias-education/
a comment there mentioned that most science students come from bhasa medium, as in English medium too much energy goes into language.
given that we have lost 60+ years, it needs a start with rooting out the red ideology, needs time to sail through the transition that we are going through. The condition is a nationalist govt. in the centre.
really, most of the highly literate persins lack the basic outlook to live life, hence the increasing number and dimension of the psychological problems.
Bahut acha……..Nice….Healthy diet for mind….to think about our Education system
That is not true any more. The law has been amended and we do not owe our country to any foreigners.
How about Annabhagya, Akshara Dasoha, shadibhagya, and Ahind policy of the Hon’ble Chief Minister Sri.Siddaramanna’s regime in Banglore.Educating the Rural Backward community. As you sre from Bangalore please write something about it to facilitate to be made known to NRI Bangaloreans in U.S.
Why is Maria ji blogs not on the Editiorial section of TOI – HT – TT!? Tell a tale of itself !?
[…] The article first appeared as- https://mariawirthblog.wordpress.com/2012/12/31/proud-to-be-educated/ […]
Please do not blame the foreigners who rules us decades ago. Any change in the education system to include Indian thoughts is called “saffronising” the education, as our “educated” leaders would say; if not calling the same “intolerance”. It is left to our Gurus to go and teach our own natives abroad in their ashrams. God Bless India ……and you.
most of the present ‘educated’ leaders who shout “saffronisation” grew up in homes where parents, grandparents were brainwashed in the British edu system.
[…] Proud to be Educated […]
Slavery to the west has really crippled many third world countries. But now slowly yet surely things are changing. All these multinational corporations and NGOs are getting their comeuppance as more indigenous knowledge and forms of culture and civilization begin to take root in the local soil. Thus such diseases of affluence as obesity and certain forms of mental illness will also be done away with in the near future since they are just the symptoms of wrong ways of eating and thinking. With right conduct and a more natural home-grown culture of doing rather than just vegetating, most people can begin to appreciate their own values and traditions which were right all along and had just been forgotten due to the curse of 200 years of colon-ialism.
[…] via Proud to be ‘educated’? — MARIA WIRTH […]
Happy that I am here! Thanks, Maria! It’s a mere irony that someone like you, who was to pass by India, had to raise such pertinent questions that have shaken the very foundation of our rich heritage! Good that you did! May you be blessed to carry out this mission!
I handsome share of what you write makes sense. I can relate to your question for I too had one or more during my schooling. I now know that the knowledge will be valued only if it translates to knowledge. Sentences like “What will you do with this knowledge snippet? When you go out in the market, people will pay you based on how much you scored in your exams” can very well tell you the value association. The trouble is that a one-person’s opinion is still a one-person’s opinion. But, when hundreds of us are talking the same thing, even lies turn to truths.
On the flipside, there are a lot of organizations (especially in the Information Technology domain) that require you to have scored good percentage in school. People get rejected from such organizations despite having the required work experience and skill set. Why are school marks given such an importance, while none of what was taught in the school would be put to use in daily work lives? You may find this question worth adding to the list you presented.
*translates to MONEY, I meant.
You are right. Even a talent like Srinivas Ramanujan would have almost fallen through the system.
True that.
Its an irony that Maria, you who came from Germany sees this clearly while none of us even question this. Mainly because we for years together have been trained to think what came from west is superior and our ancestors, their way of life was inferior. Its a shame that Mahabharata and Ramayana are labelled Mythology too.when they are clearly Itihasa (history)
The education system truly needs a revamp. And we are blessed some have identified this and have opened up Alternative Schools.
One such school in Bangalore is https://www.udhbhavaha.org/ where I am now sending my daughter ..
Please go through schools like these and forward to other parents who may be keen to provide such education to their children
Sorry saw this only now. No notification..