Inking the truth | Shivang Satya Gupta | Editor-in-Chief
The department of education finally seems on the move as a number of innovative ideas are being conceived and some of them implemented also but the colonial mindset of the powers that be do not allow such ideas to flourish due to which the real stake holders who could be the major agents of change are kept aside with the modern ideas getting suffocated due to Sarkari attitude. While Super-50 by the government is a welcome step but what creates doubts about its sustainability and utility is that it will be run by the sarkari babus who have ruined the education sector for more than six decades while the private sector which has flourished on its own is being treated as untouchable. The problem with the idea is that it encourages tuition system which otherwise is said to be the major cause of degradation of the education system in India and attributed to the major dropout rate in top professional colleges where tutored students later fail to compete. However since such proposals have worked well for grooming a select few it may work here too but what about the other lot that would be denied the facility with apprehensions that this Super-50 would also become a bone of contention between the powerful lot of the administration. Another apprehension expressed by the people is that the idea will also be utilized by the top private tutorials to get the data base of students and tap the left outs besides offering their so called top faculty at a good premium. The government which has banned the private tuition by government schools is now itself indulging in private tuitions that too restricting it to a select few while the good idea would have been to involve the private stake holders and instead of just one super-50 let there be numerous such super 50’s at local levels to groom the children in a right perspective. The most awkward question that this government may face is why it is denying the private institutions an opportunity to do similar things in vacations to groom their own students while the government too does a similar thing. We have seen numerous raids on private institutions asking them not to conduct classes in vacations but in government run schools making super-50 get legal patronage. The best way was to involve the private as well as government stake holders and churn out ideas where both the stake holders would impart best training to the students during vacations instead of limiting it to government institutions and that too Kashmir only. The education minister must introspect and instead of treating private institutions as enemies utilize their services to curb the menace of mushrooming of private tutorials and groom students in right perspective within the school premises instead of letting them be trapped by private coaching centers. Meanwhile Jammu has also started asking for similar facilities while private sector is seeking equal treatment in an era where PPP is the modern mantra but in J&K it is being done on the whims and fancies of the babus who run the state.
