Students in Bihar are compelled to take damaging short-cuts because of their parents’ misplaced aspirations
On a recent visit to Bihar, I met an old friend of mine who is the principal of a prestigious college in a small town. Curious, I asked him about how challenging it was to head an academic institution and whether the youngsters in Bihar were getting as aspirational as youths elsewhere in the country. With anguish and frustration writ large on his face, my friend narrated horrific stories on how teachers, students and parents were conducting themselves these days.
He lamented this sad and irreversible degeneration of academic culture and concluded that there remains scary darkness at the end of the tunnel.
It left me wondering if nothing has changed ever since the late 1980s. In those days, our generation was migrating from Bihar in hordes, for want of better education, and to get groomed in an inspirational culture. The academic environment those days was suffocating. Parents then were aspirational too, but their yearnings were steeped in reason and realism.
Unfortunately, the misplaced aspirations of many present day Bihari parents have grown cancerous. The spirit of competition and excellence that our parents so fondly inculcated among us has been replaced by a condescending arrogance, apathetic negligence, and brazen embrace of shortcuts to success.
The recent case of fake toppers in Bihar is symptomatic of this ugly trend which has spread its tentacles and is eroding the very foundation of the State's future.
Nothing could explain this better than the painful sight of a class XII topper, who is unable to speak or spell the term ‘political’. That the parents of this fake topper too were anxious, to throw money to get their daughter a ride to hollow fame, exhibits a severe lack of respect for academic excellence and competitive spirits.
This comes as no surprise in a State where successive Governments have done little by way of policies and infrastructure to strengthen education, drive a knowledge economy and fuel scholarship, so critical for success of modern societies.
No wonder, at 37 per cent, Bihar’s illiteracy rate is the highest in India — or to put it more commonly, at 63.2 per cent, Bihar's literacy rate is the lowest. While the State rightly boasts of having among the highest retention rates at 32 per cent in schools — percentage of students which manage to reach grade V after having entered grade I — it should exhibit equal concern over other worrying trends.
When about eight lakh of the 15.47 lakh student in class X failed to clear the examination this year, it possibly is an outcome of an abhorrent neglect by the State, serious cracks in the system, apathy of parents, and glaring lack of any respect about education among students. As one goes up the ladder, disrespect grows louder, as described by my principal friend.
When one goes a little deeper and examines the problem, one finds that this could be an influence of the predominant political and social culture in Bihar which remains intertwined with archaic systems and faulty ideals.
Many modern values, so typical of progressive societies, including industrialisation and urbanisation, have taken a backseat. While agriculture is critical, industry too has to grow to provide opportunities to the youngsters. Industry contributes a tiny five per cent to Bihar's economy. Bihar's contribution in the Indian economy stands at a tiny three per cent against a 14 per cent of Maharashtra.
One hears endlessly about the impressive jump in per capita income in Bihar, but a closer look reveals it to be highly skewed. Patna has an impressive per capita income of Rs63,063, the next three districts Munger, Begusarai and Bhagalpur lie at about Rs20,000, while, at Rs7,092, Sheohar lies at the bottom.
This highlights the huge disparities in terms of opportunities and, therefore, the income level variations. Urbanisation remains a far cry with 2011 Census putting Bihar as the second least urbanised State in the country.
In his celebrated book, Outliers, while explaining the extraordinary success of achievers, Malcolm Gladwell, wrote, “People don't rise from nothing. We do owe something to parentage and patronage… The tallest oak in the forest is the tallest not just because it grew from the hardiest acorn; it is the tallest also because no other trees blocked its sunlight, the soil around it was deep and rich, no rabbit chewed through its bark as a sapling, and no lumberjack cut it down before it matured.”
The Ruby Rais of Bihar are not growing on to become oaks because they are being suffocated as saplings under the tyranny of misplaced aspirations of their parents. We need to put all our mights to address this else this irreversible degeneration shall drown the generation next into an utter chaos.