punjab and its padhai

Punjab and its 'padhai'

The education scene can be described in one word, 'dismal'. In fact , it is a common sight in the villages which make up most of Punjab where teachers bask in the sun , knitting sweaters, drinking tea; that is if they are attending school. The situation has gone so bad that , keeping tuitions are kept by the simple illiterate folks as they cannot teach their own children. The going rate is Rs.200 , per subject and for English it's higher being Rs. 350/-. How and what is the level of education imparted where a daily farm laborer earns Rs 180/ per day ? 

Education emergency is a word which is correctly coined for the situation today in Punjab. The school systems defunct, and the nature of the teachers is not voluntary but now its job-oriented where they work for money . The duty starts in the morning ends at 2 pm. earlier in the 1960's teachers taught from the heart , they were respected , thought of as Guru's (  a person who dispels darkness) and they inculcated an all-round education . The dedication level was so high that children from villages came in the forefront and we had officers or  army officers; whereas deterioration is so high now ,that simple maths is rocket science for them

Satayajit Thind, from Ludhiana says,

"Even without the statistics, my experience in working with the manufacturing plants, companies, i have a lot of opportunity to interact with potential candidates for jobs. It has always been a wish that we employ local talent in Engg / Management jobs, but every time I interview a candidate from a rural back ground, it's such a pain to see, that they have practically no education. Unfortunately not even literate to frame a simple sentence . Education  is NIL. From understanding the basics of their subjects to writing a basic application asking for leave of absence candidates are found wanting. We have no choice but to recruit candidates from other states.

No, it would not be fair to blame any one government, the malaise is deeper and rot deadly. 

For example an institution like PAU is an institute gone absolutely bad.  I am an alumini of PAU but am sorry to say that am not so very proud of the state they are in. 

For PAU, I blame in-breeding in professors, teachers, in all faculty. We all know that nature abhors inbreeding. It leads to diseases which are genetically challenging. 

Compare this with some of the good practices followed by leading universities in the world, where they don"t allow you to take up a job as a professor immediately after completing your PhD. Do a head count as to how many PhD. in PAU got jobs in PAU after their degrees. 

So you have poor research , poor candidates and a status quo-ist approach. There is no one to challenge the thought process, no one to bring in fresh blood. 

I am not an educationist but I would offer the following plan to set up things right to set the system right.

1. Hire the best educationist, Professor, Eminent Personality and give him a salary which matches with the best in the world. ( No lets be professional and not get tied down by emotional quotient on this one. We want results)

2. Under this gentleman or lady, constitute a board or a body of eminent personalities in the field of education. ( Avoiding political patronage as much as possible) 

3. Give them full powers to over haul the system.

4. The moment you want to overhaul the system, the teachers brigade will strike. Be ready for it. 

5. One way to tackle or weed out the dead wood of teachers could be a board or examination to check their knowledge base. Only fit teachers be retained.

6. It must be mandatory for any teacher to teach in rural schools for half their career span. 

7. Absconding teachers from village schools can be tackled by the village panchayats. let the attendence registers be counter signed by the Panch members.

8. Termination in case teachers are found not attending school or if the mandatory village education tenures have been found subverted.

9. Provide a budget as if there is no tomorrow. 

10. All appointments to teachers should be merit based. Exams, interviews, and then counseling. Most teachers take to teaching as an easy job. It's not just a job it's a process of nation building. 

11. And the most important thing, the salaries of teachers, professors should be the highest across any government segment. More than the bureaucrats, or any other state department. 

12. Recognize them for their contribution and encourage them with good perks and the best talent will start to go towards teaching.

13. It's an urgent need. If we start today, we will see results after two decades. 

Its not exhaustive,,,,of course, we need action.

Education has been recognized as the single tool which brings forward a state. Punjab lags behind shamefully , we need to not go on paper reports , but on ground reality where if one goes to the village , children are painfully shy , cannot frame basic sentences and have little or nothing knowledge of science. This is because it is a paid profession , it has changed from the ethical voluntary and respected profession of yester yore. What has also made it worse is that the selection and promotion is now based majorily on Sifarish and 'pressure' from above. And if that is not enough the teachers resort to strike if their demands are not met . They end up holding the state to ransom . The teachers should be promoted via competent authority which consists of an independent set of highly competent individuals who are incorruptible. 

Previously , in the 60's a teacher would be paid roughly around rs30 but now the same teacher draws a salary of rs 18,000. Gurdev Kaur in the year 1960 , drew salary of rs 30 in Mithapur School , where as now the teacher draws a salary of Rs 20000, but the level of teaching has deteriorated absymally. The situation is so  bad that children in the primary school cannot do simple addition , subtraction orally. 

The nail in the coffin in the sector is that the teachers themselves are not competent. How will they impart education if they themselves are not educated in the art of education?  WE need teachers who have been selected on merit because the rural parent himself is by and large illiterate and is poor , he would rather have the child helping out and contributing to the house income than studying and be a burden. The parent himself is so scared to talk to 'Masterji ' that he cannot question on behalf of the child. This vicious circle can only be broken if we have empathetic teachers who are sensitive to the need of the child who is shy , not confident and has a host of problems . For him coming to school itself is a struggle and then to learn and combat the ABC's which do not offer him deliverance from the poverty and struggle  . It is important that we educate our teachers to be counsellors first and then teachers second as they will give us tomorrow.

Punjab needs an immediate complete overhaul so that we save our most precious resource the child who hungers for the basics which are his birthright and we are guilty of  mortgaging his future at the hands of corruption , a malaise which runs deep and is nightmarish. To recover it back and to put it back on track we have to follow the old proverb,'Give a man a fish , he will eat for a day , teach him how to fish and he will eat for a life time',Confucious.

What Punjabis , require is motivation for the child of today and tomorrow so that he may be independent , we need to give them subsidy or an easy way out , what is needed is to motivate the child in the right environment to stand up to meet the challenges of tomorrow and not be left behind .