Futile advertising splurge
According to reports emanating from Davos, Switzerland where the World Economic Forum (WEF) is staging its 36th annual meeting with a medley of politicians, businessmen, movie stars (including Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt) rubbing shoulders in this most expensive of Swiss ski resorts, the government sponsored India Brand Equity Fund has plastered Davos with posters, buntings and sundry materials trumpeting the great achievements of India, projected as the world’s most attractive FDI (foreign direct investment) destination. The fund has reportedly splurged a massive Rs.17 crore on advertising in sidewalks, buses, cafeterias, and cocktail binges under its India Everywhere campaign. But unfortunately carpet-bombing advertising is no substitute for solid on-the-ground performance as the government babus who commissioned the India Everywhere blitz are discovering at the Indian taxpayer’s cost. Comparitive data projected on the big screens during seminars and workshops show up India as a poor also-ran compared to China on most development indicators, all the bluff and bluster of Union commerce minister Kamal Nath, finance minister P. Chidambaram and trojan horse liberaliser Rahul Bajaj notwithstanding. And to add insult to injury to the massive 150-strong Indian contingent at Davos, Pakistan’s General Musharraf was introduced by WEF chairman Klaus Schwab as the strongman presiding over an economy which "has recorded the second highest growth in Asia, after China".
The plain truth is that every foreign businessman with a modicum of intelligence is well aware of India’s pathetic infrastructure, persistent red tape, rampant unchecked corruption and lop-sided, inequitable growth not to speak of the law’s delay. And no amount of expensive advertising can cover up this reality. High time high-flying babus given to splurging tax rupees realised this.
Tale of one district
When Uttar Pradesh undertook a massive textbook writing programme in 2001, it was hailed as a welcome initiative. With zealous intent, the state’s education ministry set about revamping textbooks to make them more interactive and child friendly. Five years down the line, it seems to have been an exercise in futility. Last month (January), 20,000 textbooks and teachers’ guides were found rotting in a Lucknow District Educational Research and Training (DSERT) centre. And none in the education ministry seem to know how they had been overlooked.The books should have been distributed free under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan programme to the 274 government run primary schools in the district at the commencement of the academic year 2003-04. Since the syllabus has not changed, the books, if printed in excess, could have been distributed again at the start of the past academic year (2005-06). "The book distribution process is verified at every step. It’s amazing how nobody noticed this anomaly," says basic education officer Sunita Rastogi.
In a belated cover up, the ministry has declared that it will try to make the best use of the forgotten textbooks. This might prove difficult as about 700 have been eaten away by termites. Moreover the error would never have come to light had the godown not been aired for cleaning. In the ministry records, these books are being shown as distributed.
This is a tale of one district in UP. There are 69 others.
Desperate graduates
It’s a telling comment upon shining India’s government dominated university and higher education system. Following word-of-mouth publicity — no formal advertisement was issued — that the Bhagalpur (Bihar) central jail had a vacancy for the hangman’s job, jail superintendent — Vishwanath Prasad — has received a busload of applications from across Bihar for the job, which reportedly pays Rs.15,000-20,000 per execution. Applicants included graduates, postgraduates, even MBAs. According to the bemused Prasad who has forwarded all applications to his superiors to shortlist candidates for interview, most applicants admitted to lack of experience but promised to "work hard" at the job.It’s ironic but true that a millennium ago Bihar’s great universities of Nalanda and Taxila attracted students from around the world. But under a succession of charismatic post-independence chief ministers culminating in the 15-year reign of backward castes champion Lalu Prasad Yadav who finally got his comeuppance in the Bihar assembly election of last December, academic standards in the state have plumbed the depths even as there’s been a continuous flight of capital from Bihar.
Hence the desperation of the state’s youth. Meanwhile Lalu has landed another job in New Delhi as the high-profile Union minister of railways, which under his supervision has become profitable after a long time. Never mind his record of a rail accident every month.
End of the road?
With his term in the Rajya Sabha ending this month, it looks like the end of the road for Congress party stalwart and Union HRD minister Arjun Singh (76). Elected to the upper house from Madhya Pradesh, Singh’s chances of re-election have dimmed because MP is now ruled by the BJP to whom he is anathema. If Singh fails to be re-elected, it will mark the end of a long career in politics for this Nehruvian socialist who believes in state intervention — the more the better. When the UPA was formed in May 2004, Singh was hotly tipped to head the powerful home ministry, but had to settle for the ‘lesser’ HRD portfolio. As education minister, after a brisk and proactive beginning when he repaired the damage caused by his predecessor, the combative Dr. Murli Manohar Joshi, lately Singh is reported to have lost interest in his job and in particular, has shut the door on journalists. Simultaneously he has maximised state intervention in education institutions from behind closed doors, declining to explain his policy diktats to the media. Over a dozen letters from EducationWorld demanding responses in person or on paper, about burning education issues remain unacknowledged.
If he is forced to exit soon, few tears are likely to be shed — in academia or the media.