The lumpenisation of education in Maharashtra (pop.112 million) — India’s most industrialised state accounting for almost 25 percent of the country’s annual industrial output — is proceeding almost unchecked, and is indeed accelerating, as the municipal and state assembly elections dates draw near.
On November 29, activists of the Maharashtra Navnirman Vidyarthi Sena (MNVS) — student wing of MNS, a regional political party notorious for its hooliganism and sub-nationalism — barged into the cabin of Vilas Shinde, controller of examinations at Mumbai University’s Kalina campus, tarred his face and assaulted him for allegedly leaking the third year bachelor of management studies (BMS) exam paper the previous week. Earlier on November 27, the university had announced that it would conduct a re-exam for the leaked paper. The youth demanded Shinde’s resignation, holding him responsible.
Two days later activists of the Yuva Sena — youth wing of the Shiv Sena, the parent sub-nationalist political party registered by former cartoonist Bal Thackeray in 1966 — beat up a physical training teacher of IES Manik Vidya Mandir, Bandra for allegedly slapping some class X students on a school picnic. “We received a written complaint against the teacher. We went to question him ourselves. It was a really disgraceful act on his part,” says Yuva Sena member Pradeep Sawant, justifying the action.
On December 8, four people were arrested for the assault on Shinde and damage to public property, and released on bail the following day.
Not to be outdone, on December 14 MNVS activists once again barged into the office of the principal of DAV School, in the suburb of Nerul, tarred his face and roughed up other staff members alleging that the school’s buses were flouting safety norms. “We wanted to check if schools were following bus safety norms. We had sent notices to all schools in Navi Mumbai two weeks ago,” explained Santosh Gavas, vice-president of MNVS.
The party’s activists arrived at the school along with media and quizzed principal Jose Kurien, on the condition of buses used by the school. “We found that their school buses weren’t equipped with first-aid boxes or fire extinguishers. This is violation of law,” added Gavas.
“Our teachers as well as other staff members are very disturbed about this incident. We can’t understand why these activists treated our principal this way. We will ensure a proper investig-ation and action against the perpetr-ators,” vows K.B. Kushal, regional director of the DAV Group of schools.
These blatant and continuous phy-sical attacks on teachers, principals and even top university officials — and the state government’s lukewarm response to them — has sparked anger and outrage within the beleaguered teachers’ community in Mumbai. “Principals have to shoulder numerous responsibilities and can’t be physically attacked by lumpen elements who are ignorant of the ABCs of institutional governance. The police should arrest, and courts summarily try and sentence these hooligans instead of letting them off on bail the very next day, so they can resume their mischief and interference. Local thugs and goons employed by fringe political parties are creating a fear psychosis within the teachers community,” says the principal of a minority school in downtown Mumbai who preferred to remain anonymous.
The silver lining of these lumpen attacks on teachers and educators is that this beleaguered community has been sufficiently provoked to fight back. The Navi Mumbai Schools Association has strongly condemned the MNVS attack on the DAV School’s principal and teachers, and has asked for special police protection. “We are obliged to confront such situations every year during the admissions season when random people from political parties walk into our offices and demand preferential admission for their relatives. We are threatened all the time. It’s high time a solution is found,” says Fr. Saturnino Almeida, president of the association.
With education increasingly being neglected by the Central and state governments pre-occupied with politicking and primitive capital accumulation, academic standards are contin-uously slipping as overdue reforms in school and higher education are on distant back-burners. And to the numerous problems of vice chancellors, principals and teachers struggling to maintain standards in India’s most industrial state, add one more — breakdown of law and order.
Bharati Thakore (Mumbai)
Embarrassing faux pas
One of India’s top-ranked private universities has been accused of committing elementary testing errors which even unknown and comparatively resources-deficient education institutions are seldom charged with. The well-known Symbiosis International University (SIU) — an autonomous multi-institution varsity sited in Pune, awarded A grade status by NAAC (National Assessment and Accredit-ation Council), ranked among the country’s Top 50 universities in the India Today league tables, and prom-oted by the high-profile Symbiosis Society (estb.1971) which comprises 19 academic institutions spread over nine campuses in Pune, Noida, Bangalore and Nashik — is inundated with complaints alleging gross testing negligence.
Thousands of students who wrote its Symbiosis National Aptitude (SNAP) Test 2011 conducted on December 18 in 30 cities countrywide, allege incorrect options, incomplete information, inconsistent data and poor management in this entrance exam. SNAP is a common and mandatory written test for admission into all postgraduate institutes of SIU. Close to 50,000 candidates wrote the test including 8,000 in Pune.
Comments a student who wrote the two-hour SNAP test in Pune: “We found that quite a few questions were directly lifted from model question papers circulated to their students by a few coaching institutes in the city. So there is even a possibility of a question paper leak.” According to A. Nishanth, a Hyderabad-based student, writing on an online blog: “There were elementary typos in this national exam. What is the meaning of words such as ‘massenger’ and ‘kernal’? Can the Symbiosis management please explain?” Blogged another student: “We pay Rs.1,650 for writing the exam. We expect at least an error-free and consistent test paper.”
Typically neither Vidya Yerwadekar, principal director of the Symbiosis Society which governs SIU, nor her father Dr. S.B. Mujumdar, chancellor of SIU, were available for comment despite the repeated efforts of your corres-pondent. However the SIU management has posted a clarification on its website (www.siu.edu.in) signed by registrar Madhu Sharma. “In continuation of the SIU legacy, the question papers are set by subject experts with intensive experience and knowledge. Strict confidentiality is maintained throughout the process. We do understand that some of the questions could be non-traditional and relatively difficult to crack due to our increased (sic) standards and benchmarks. We wish to clarify that SIU does not have any tie-up with any coaching institutions.”
But this pusillanimous explanation hasn’t cut any ice with over 200 students who have demanded a re-test, failing which they have threatened to file a public interest litigation (PIL) against SIU, whose Symbiosis Institute of Business Management demands — and gets — an annual tuition fee of Rs.3.9 lakh.
Although some outraged students have complained to the All India Council of Technical Education (AICTE) and the Union human resource development ministry in Delhi, the Majumdars are well networked and have considerable influence in Delhi. “For a powerful education behemoth such as SIU this is a minor embarrassment. Students who wrote the test and naively expect admi-ssion on merit will protest for a while, but won’t have the time or resources to pursue the matter to its logical end,” comments a B-school professor in the city who requested anonymity.
Informed academics in this industrial and academic hub ascribe this faux pas to the management’s over-emphasis on infrastructure rather than faculty development. SIU is Pune’s most high profile and glamorous higher education private sector conglomerate, a city within the city spread over 300 acres, boasting numerous steel and glass buildings and a community of 27,000 students. “In reality SIU is more a real estate development than education enterprise, a common failing of private education groups. Hence these embarr-assing errors,” adds the perceptive B-school professor.
A revaluation of priorities and course correction is clearly required.
Huned Contractor (Pune)