दृष्टिकोण – Indra's Viewpoint

On September 20, the column of Speaking Tree had an article by Kamlesh Dixit, ‘A guru to provide safe harbour’.

I remember many years ago, my uncle induced Yamuna and me to have ‘Gurumukh’ from a Guruji. We had come to our village for a vacation from Calcutta. I didn’t believe in the ritual, but I couldn’t refuse my uncle too. In a small function at home, we took ‘gurumantra’ from our young guruji who was a teacher by profession. We would have paid him some money as usual. The Guruji happened to be the son of a learned priest who was the guru of my parents and uncles in the family. On many occasion, I heard him emphasizing his point of view with help of Sanskrit slokas. I used to get immensely impressed. But thereafter I got busy in my profession and the visits to the village became rare. We couldn’t meet our guruji. His father also had left the village, which was where we had our farmland.

Many a times, I felt like seeking a guru who could answer at least some of my queries about our religion and the contents of some of the religious books. I wanted someone who could give the contemporary explanation of the teachings and rituals prescribed in our religion. Unfortunately, I have not got one till date. The story of Swami Vivekananda and Ramakrishna given below that Dixit has included in his article, makes me think again about finding a guru.

When Swami Vivekananda first visited Ramakrishna he asked: “I have read the Bhagavad Gita and other scriptures several times, I lecture and give discourses on the Gita and Ramayana. Do I still need harbour of a saint; do I still need a guru?”

Ramakrishna didn’t reply to Vivekananda’s question. After a few days Ramakrishna called upon Vivekananda and handed him a parcel to be delivered at a nearby village a few hours away by the sea route.

Early morning the boat and sailor would be ready and all he needed to do was to go to the village and deliver the parcel to the designated person.

Vivekananda agreed and decided to start early. He found the boat and the sailor ready to put out to sea. Suddenly, upon sitting in the boat, Vivekananda realised that he didn’t know the road to the village. He inquired of the sailor who had no clue, either. Vivekananda decided to go back to his guru to ask him the shortest way to the village.

Upon this Ramakrishna said, “Narendra, this is my reply to the question you asked me when we met the first time: Today, you have the medium (the boat), you have the resource (the sailor), you have the road (the sea), you know what to do (deliver the parcel) and you also know where to go but you don’t know the way. Likewise you have read all the scriptures, and you can conduct wonderful discourses on them. However, to realise the wisdom of scriptures one needs a guru, someone who has already traversed that path so that he can guide you through the journey and encourage you to not give up”.

In Sanskrit, ‘gu’ is one who dispels and ‘ru’ means darkness. Every individual who wishes to rise above his existing levels needs someone in life who can help in dispelling darkness and provide light when needed.

I hope one day I find my guru or my guru detects me and picks me up.

In 1974, a farmer, while digging his well, discovered first of the life-sized clay figure of soldiers of the famous terracotta army of China. Archeologists described it as the greatest archeological find of the 20th century. The first emperor wanted to be buried with his army and hoped to continue conquering even after the life.

The terracotta army was found, around the first emperor’s tomb in Xi’an, China. The site is said to contain at least 7,000 of these clay soldiers, arranged in military formation. So far, only 1,000 or so have been excavated.

Ying became the king of Qin (pronounced “chin”) when he was just 13. Qin was the westernmost of the seven provinces that were to make up the united China. Qin wasn’t the strongest of them. In fact, it was one of the weaker ones.

Ying became king in 247 BC. By 221 BC, he had succeeded in subjugating all the other provinces, creating what is known today as China. He ruled as first emperor until 210 BC, and he died at an early age of 49.

Some consider, the first emperor’s dream of conquering all his neighbours, then doing it all again in the after life, as a madman’s dream. He was simultaneously a practical genius who organised and prepared his society so thoroughly, and with such attention to detail. He gave China a script that is still in use today. He created a working administration whose descendants still run the country.

Ying was so determined to take everything with him to the afterlife that he commanded acrobats to be made for him. His actual tomb has not yet been excavated, but it’s said he re-created his entire empire down there, with rivers made of mercury, a false sky filled with stars and ersatz mountains to climb and dream on.

I read this story taken from ‘Sunday Times, London’. It made think who should be called the first king of India. These days it has become a fashion to compare India with China. Every now and then we find such stories in media. Will the credit go to Chandragupta Maurya or his grandson Ashoka? I shall like the credit to go to Chandragupta.

‘At Sravana Belgola, more famous for the massive sculpture of Gomteshwara, a Jain teacher, Chandragupta is said to have passed his final days in austerity and devotions. Chandragupta is supposed to have resided on Chandragiri, a less known hill nearby. Inscriptions and reliefs dating back to the fifth century AD record his presence; and a low cave amidst the granite scarps is said to be where, in the ultimate act of Jain self-denial, the emperor finally starved himself to death.’ Source- India -A History by John Keay

Just think for a moment. Chadragupta Maurya becomes the first great emperor of India, conquers almost the whole of India duly assisted by the statecraft of Chankya, and then leaves everything and starves himself far away from Patliputra as an ordinary man, perhaps with no big rituals, processions, or memorials. Appreciate the difference. And then get reminded of the news in media where Atalji wishes to come back again in active politics!

A NASSOCOM-McKinsey study last year predicted a shortfall of 5,00,000 by 2010 for IT sector. It shocked the Indians who were languishing under the perception of its demographic advantage, as India turns out 4,00,000 plus engineers a year. Admissions last year in engineering schools touched 5,69,000. India has around 350 universities and about 17,700 undergraduate colleges. But according to Nasscom, only a quarter of technical graduates and 10-15% of general college graduates are suitable for employment in offshore It and BPO industries. All good companies are having their own institutes to train the fresh graduates. An increased interactions between the industry and engineering colleges can sort out the drawbacks of the engineering education system.

However, is it not surprising that the number of admissions in engineering so low, when in a single state like Bihar about 6,91,000 students appears for the Matric examinations? Surprisingly, as per data compiled by YS Rajan, Principal Adviser, CII, only 1.5% out of students who join school go for higher professional education and only 8% graduate. India will have to improve upon these percentages.

Primary Education

Today, over 95% of children between ages 5 and 10 is enrolled in schools and there is a school within 1 km of every habitation, barring few in Bihar and Rajasthan. Because of many initiatives such as Sarv Shiksha Aviyan and mid-day meal, the number of out-of-the school children in the 6-14 age group has dropped from 13.4 million in 2005 to 7.06 million by end-March 2006. But, shockingly, about 70% students drop out by the time they reach class 8. It gets reflected in the workforce population too. As per a Goldman Sachs report, in 2000, the working age population in India, had, on average, attended 5.1 year of school, compared to 6.4 years in China and 6.8 years in Malaysia. There are hardly any options to join vocational education after one drops out before completing class X, the minimum requirement for getting admitted in ITI. It is necessary that an innovative approach be taken to get them skilled in hundreds of various trades that can make them employable, even with help of people just experienced enough to provide the training, if the regular teachers are not available. Both manufacturing and service enterprises can come out to train them.
But another concern is about the quality of education system at the primary level. As reported, “Children learn little. Whereas they are expected to learn to read fluently by the end of standard 2, only about 50% can read fluently even in standard 5.” And that must improve by making the teachers more accountable through fresh training, and if the parents start taking interest into the education of their children. Panchayats and other social groups including NGOs can also contribute.

The quality of education in rural India is poorer. One of the main reasons is the lack of education among the mothers. There seems to be a relation between the education of the mother and the prevalence of the child remaining out of school and/or their performance. The ASER-Pratham survey of rural schools confirms this. It reports that the chances that a child is out of school are much higher for an unschooled mother. Looking at reading skills for children aged six to eight, 25 per cent of those with unschooled mothers cannot recognise alphabets compared to 13 per cent for children with educated mothers.

Trade Education

There is a serious shortage of skilled workers too for a sector such as real estate and construction. It is difficult to get good plumbers, carpenter, electricians, and even bricklayers.

India has 6,500-odd Industrial training Institutes meant to impart vocational training. There must be sufficient trade schools that can impart training to all those who don’t go for higher education. Moreover the present institutes must teach more trades instead of sticking with old and outdated 10-120 trades. In China, the students get an option out of about 4,500 trades.

Starting from the Budget for 2004-05, the Finance Minister Chidambaram is trying to upgrade Industrial Trade Institutes. In his first, he announced that 500 ITIs would be taken up for modernisation. Later, 100 ITIs were taken up for upgrades with domestic resources in a Rs 160 crore scheme, and 400 with World Bank assistance. This year Chidambaram’s Budget announced again that 1,396 industrial training institutes would be upgraded into centres of excellence in specific trades and skills through private-public partnerships (PPPs), with 300 being taken up every year from 2007-08 onwards with the cooperation of states. However, perhaps the model followed by Haryana is worth emulation by other states. The companies such as Sona Koyo Steering (at Nagina), Liberty Shoes (Karnal), Jai Bharat Maruti (Faridabad) and Maruti Udyog Ltd (Gurgaon and Rohtak) having signed MoUs to adopt five ITIs.

Chidambaram proposed an interest-free grant of Rs 2.5 crore to each ITI for revamping, and the allocation of Rs 750 crore for the modernisation of 300 ITIs every year, starting 2007-08. However, I doubt if the heads of these institutes are qualified and experienced enough to use the money efficiently. Industry and institutes tie-ups under a consultative committee of technical people could provide the best solutions.

Raghuram G. Rajan, the IMF’s chief economist once opined that ‘India could be a global leader in education and financial services, to name just two possibilities’. And certainly, India can. However, the education system in India requires an overhaul.

The annual feature ‘State of the States’ survey of ‘India Today’ that claims to provide the definitive ranking of the quality of life across India appeared in its September 24, 2007 issue. I was eagerly waiting for it to see if after almost two years of Nitish Kumar on the chief minister’s chair, Bihar makes some improvement in the rankings of Bihar. However, Shankkar Aiyar in his cover story has clearly pronounced: “The performance measured is that of states, not their chief ministers. All data used in the study is objective and taken from central government sources, as has been in the past four years.” But the survey and its findings can certainly help the state ministers and the bureaucracy working under it to take some lessons and make a roadmap to improve the overall performance of the state. The observations of the study and certain data on Bihar’s state of affairs are painful. It is more so when you see many states that were far behind after the independence coming ahead of Bihar, as Bihar has slipped to the bottom.

Bihar remains being ranked at the bottom among large states on eight parameters for all the five years ‘India Today’ has been publishing this ranking. Worse, the state scores less than one on a scale of 10 on critical parameters like agriculture, health, education and governance. To get an idea of how bad things are, let’s look at some comparative figures.

The average yield per hectare in Bihar is 1,535 kg compared to 3,943 in Punjab. In agriculture, Bihar rank deteriorated from 11 in 2004 to 12 in 2005, and now to 14 since 2006. It is based on the variables such as percentage of cropped area under cash crops, gross state domestic product/rural population, electricity consumption for agriculture/rural population, food grain yield, loans extended to agriculture households cultivating land, net irrigated area/not sown area. Despite being among the most water-rich states, Bihar has only 60% of its cropped area irrigated. Will the chief minister hold the agriculture minister and his bureaucracy accountable to certain extent and come out with some plan to improve it providing a target for the next three years that he will be ruling?

Bihar has just 62 affluent households per 1,000 in rural areas, which means only 62 households per 1,000 are in the Rs 690 to Rs 1155 and more income bracket and 122 households per 1,000 with incomes between Rs 930 and Rs 2,450 or more in urban areas. The comparable figures for Punjab are 509 and 393 households per 1,000 in rural and urban areas, respectively. 37.48% in Bihar live below poverty line (BPL) against the national average of 27% with BPL defined as the availability of at least 2,400 calories per capita per day for rural areas and 2,100 per capita per day for urban areas. Bihar has a per capita income of Rs 6,311 as against Mizoram’s Rs 27,733. Is it not a disgrace?

Bihar’s ownership of TV sets is at the bottom with only 14.97 % households, whereas even Jharkhand’s percentage is 23.94. How can the people know about what is happening in the country all around?

And more depressingly, barely 14% of the households in Bihar report having an electricity connection that is way below even the national average where 55% of the households have electricity. How can the prosperity come in this era where electricity is basic necessity for any manufacturing activity?

Bihar’s literacy rate is 46 per cent and only 37 per cent of 10-plus children have completed primary education. And still some from Bihar keep on boasting about its performance in education sector, heritage and false claims of having maximum numbers from Bihar in administrative services or IITs.

“Sixty years after independence, only 27% of child birth cases are medically assisted in Bihar meaning seven out of ten children are delivered without medical assistance which is the reason why for every 1,000 children born as many as 60 die at child birth.”

The cover story has referred to ‘having a large contingent of Cabinet ministers from Tamil Nadu’ as a help in its better ranking. I am sure Bihar had and has equally good number of cabinet ministers for decades. Why has it not helped the state?

However the study reveals at least one good aspect of the state of economy. Bihar (undivided) stands third best in poverty drop with 12.94 percent after Assam (21.02%) and Himachal Pradesh 18.80). Bihar has shown relative improvement in health too.

Unfortunately, though many good things are happening in Bihar under Nitish Kumar, I feel he is still very conservative. I am amazed with his opposition to SEZs. If SEZs can benefit the whole of country, why is that it will not do so in Bihar? Bihar will have to get urbanize faster and that too in planned manner, if it wishes to be in race. Nitish Kumar may satisfy his constituency but it will not bring development. He will have to be aggressive.

I wish next year the ranking showed improvement.