The great majority of middle class India, I suspect, owes a deep debt of gratitude to Christian missionary educationists who run perhaps one-fifth of India’s 75,000 private aided and unaided schools across the subcontinent. The great majority of them provide all-important English medium school education which — although the country’s cynical politicians elbow-deep in sub-standard vernacular textbook printing rackets will never admit it — is the indispensable passport to affluence and socio-economic status in this ruthlessly unequal society shaped by the brain-dead heirs of the Mahatma.
Certainly I do owe and acknowledge, a deep debt to Christian missionary educationists for the dedication and forbearance with which they taught me the 3 R’s. Indeed such was the reputation and fame of India’s church-run boarding schools that I was sent a long way from East Africa to study in one of them, a parental decision which — despite the caning culture and peer bullying which boarding schools of yesteryear were heir to — I have never regreted. On the contrary, the experience persuaded me to migrate to India to do my bit for the greater good of the greatest number here.
Although my alma mater — Bishop Cotton Boys, Bangalore — is an Anglican church-run institution, I am well aware of the comparable K-12 education provided to thousands of students across the country by the dedicated and committed education missionaries of the Society of Jesus, famously known as Jesuits. Some of my most cherished triumphs were scored in epic battles on the games field with the rival Jesuit-run St. Joseph’s School, Bangalore. Yet it’s perhaps accurate to say that although the Society of Jesus runs 155 schools across the country, it doesn’t dominate the primary-secondary schools sector to the same extent as it does collegiate education. All the 31 Jesuit colleges countrywide are highly rated by NAAC (National Assessment and Accreditation Council), and four of them are routinely ranked among the top 10 in the annual India Today league tables of the country’s most reputed colleges.
Therefore when we heard on the grapevine that the Society has made a formal proposal to the Union government to establish a centrally-funded Xavier University of India which will affiliate 22 of the best Jesuit colleges across the country, naturally there was considerable excitement in the editorial office of this publication. After some hesitation, the modest leaders of the Society were persuaded to share their dreams and aspirations about the proposed university with EducationWorld. The outcome is an inspiring story about the low-profile Society of Jesus and its high-potential plan, which could hugely raise teaching-learning standards in India’s rapidly obsolescing higher education system.
And to write this month’s special report feature on the pros and cons of politicians in education, Lucknow-based special correspondent Vidya Pandit networked with EW correspondents across the country to file a thought-provoking feature. Contrary to popular belief, yes, there is benefit to society.
