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  Beyond Education

  While casually chatting about the significance of knowledge with a kid who is very dear to me, I recalled two Sanskrit Shlokas my father always emphasized to drive home the importance of knowledge and even greater importance of passion to seek knowledge. Thought worth sharing these Shlokas that greatly shaped my worldview, life & career.
  
  Thus goes the first one:
  
  न चौरहार्यं न च राजहार्यं न भ्रातृभाज्यं न च भारकारी ।
  व्यये कृते वर्धते एव नित्यं विद्याधनं सर्वधन प्रधानम् ॥
  
  Thieves cannot steal it, Kings (state) cannot confiscate it, nor is it divisible amongst siblings, nor is it heavy to carry around.
  It’s a wealth, the more you spend, the more it grows, indeed wealth of knowledge is undoubtedly the greatest wealth.
  
  And here is the second one:
  
  विद्यां ददाति विनयं, विनयाद् याति पात्रताम् ।
  पात्रत्वात् धनमाप्नोति, धनात् धर्मं ततः सुखम् ॥
  
  Knowledge enables modesty & humility, through modesty & humility one attains ability (skills), with ability comes wealth. And wealth enables one to get means of comfort and happiness.
  
  Bottomline - knowledge & skills are crucial & instrumental to the path of success, comfort and happiness. Further, it’s the wealth that never parts way with you, hence it is the only wealth worth acquiring, rest everything follows.
  
  Please note, we often mistake knowledge with education. Education is one of many formal ways to get knowledge, but not the only one. I know many knowledgeable and inspirational people who had had little or no formal education. Education is necessary, but more important is the quest for knowledge, whether through education and/or any avenue available.

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  Kota Factories

  The spate of suicides by young medical & engineering aspirants is extremely heart-wrenching, to say the least. As father of a young lad in early twenties, I can relate closely to this.
  
  The authorities in Kota have taken steps - some outright absurd and lacking imagination & sensitivity, others are like applying band-aid to a gunshot wound.
  
  We need to find out the root causes and the path that has led us to this murky desolate situation.
  
  Over a million students write JEE every year and you have to be in 99.5 percentile to have any hope of getting into a really good engineering institute, because they are so few!! NEET, the entrance exam for MBBS is even harder.
  
  And in this country, which has been home to world's greatest philosophers, leaders, teachers and home to four great religions (the oldest one included), every parent wants their kids to be doctors or engineers. As if there is no life beyond these two professions. Parents will accept their kids as a mediocre engineer than a fantastic teacher or a courageous soldier or a top notch lawyer. Why blame the students? Parents are first and foremost to be held accountable.
  
  Next is the absurd level of difficulty of the questions in JEE. I am not saying at all that we should go back to board marks or do away with meritocracy. But in trying to defeat coaching angle in selection process, we kept on increasing the difficulty level of questions to a level where it has become reductio ad absurdum!!
  
  The questions are so tough that even brilliant students stand no chance of getting through without help from professional coaching institutes. So in order to limit their influence, we have made the coaching institutes all-powerful.
  
  And the coaching institutes have no agenda except to get as many students through the JEE/NEET as they can, hence they focus only on extraordinary students, and the mere mortals fall behind. They are not only under pressure to get into a better batch, they also have to carry the burden of their parents and extended families and the fact that many families send their kids to these coaching institutes while making huge sacrifices in order to pay the hefty tuition fees.
  
  And remember, these are 15-18 year old kids. Most of them have never stayed alone and prone to buckle under duress. Rather than being their pillars of support, parents are just rushing them out to the trenches.
  
  We need to stop stealing their adolescence and youth. Let them be free of sense of being trapped in a trench with no hope. Let them bask in their youth. There is life beyond engineering and medical colleges. Homi Bhabha was not an engineer, nor was Gandhi a doctor. Neither are Harish Salve, Narendra Modi, Sachin Tebdulkar or Field Marshall Manekshaw. And they have all made their families and their nations proud.
  
  Rather than installing spring-fans and keeping weekly tests in abeyance, let us work to educate parents to moderate their expectations, look at other facets of life and career; and make the entrance exams more comprehensive but reasonably tough, rather than short but extremely tough so that coaching centres become more important than premier institutes themselves.
  
  Indian mind is one of the best, and our youth are extra ordinary. Let's give them chance to bloom and make India proud.

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  Emily evans

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  Henry william

  Richard was hired to create a corporate identity. We were very pleased with the work done. She has a lot of experience and is very concerned about the needs of client. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, ullamcous cididt consectetur adipiscing elit, seds do et eiusmod tempor incididunt ut laborels dolore magnarels alia.