On My Mind

Indian Education System finds a place very often in news, mostly for all the wrong reasons. As India traces its path to development and economic growth, the massive demographic dividend that it carries lies on the borderline of becoming a demographic disaster. Among all the factors of production, the most valuable and cherished, in this era of globalization, is unarguably human capital. Humans are the most productive resources if invested well with education. Unfortunately, our education system lacks awfully in all aspects - coverage, quality, and content. Persistent Problems Enrollment Woes:  The Lower primary education or play school lags in its coverage. As of 2011, the enrollment rate for pre-primary schools is 58%.  [1]   The Gross Enrollment Ratio stands at 99.21% for Primary schools and 92.81% for Upper Primary Schools. [2] While this looks good, a cursory glance at its counterpart - Net Enrollment Ratio - highlights the issue of education system’...

Dear Diary, As usual, I am stupefied by people around me. The world is terribly slow, it barely crawls. I feel constrained, not by the lack of pace in my life, but in those of around me.  Just today itself, when the flight landed, no one stood. I repeat, no one stood. They kept sitting in their god damn seats! I was the lone passenger standing in the aisle, waiting for the door to open. No soul behind me, not one in front! Such was the lack of competition in this race running in my mind.  I strongly feel such brazen display of common sense should be outlawed.  The other day, I stood at the counter waiting for my turn. The receptionist was calling us by the token numbers but how does it even matter! There is no better pleasure than a crowd gathered around, and people creating a ruckus in a system that can be orderly. Luckily, I wasn't disappointed then. The impatience, the constant hovering around the counter, the sweet smell of sweaty humans askin...

It is impressive, bigger and better than what I imagined it to be. It is situated in the heart of Delhi but remains hidden. The market of ideological jargon is booming and is filled with teeming buyers for the most part of the day. There is something for everyone here. Much inspired by the penchant of Trump for good deals, my right-wing friend who accompanied me got a great deal himself. The shopkeeper gave him a complimentary list of Islamic countries where people could be asked to go when he purchased a bottle of nationalism. I was amazed and kept looking around. My eyes soon fixated on a big store. I took leave from my friend who by then had taken a dose to test the efficacy of the potion. While I was wandering around the store, I managed to catch hold of a salesperson (no, not salesman! I bought tablets of political correctness myself). He was helpful and gave me a detailed account of this hidden market. I remember a part of the conversation which I have jotted down for yo...

If you have read something about Gandhiji, you are likely to have come across the three monkeys. He had a small statue of them. One of them covered his eyes, the message being, "see no evil". The second monkey had his ears covered, urging to "hear no evil". The third monkey covered his mouth who "speaks no evil". I believe we have grasped the message well and are doing the same; the teeny tiny difference being our ignorance of diversity. The three monkey today signify the principle - see no diversity, hear no diversity, speak no diversity; else you're a racist, xenophobic, narrow-minded, et cetera. A simple google search tells that racism is "prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior." Pretty simple to understand, right? Apparently not! Homo Sapiens reside in different parts of the world. Owing to the geographical conditions and lack of...

"Nah, this isn't catchy enough.Add something to it. Be a little creative Manoj!" "Ma'am, she's Muslim. Should we draw the image of a Muslim woman beating conservative attitudes?" "Isn't good, besides, it looks communal. Make her an underdog. That sells 100 out of 100 times." "Ok! Consider it done." Next day, newspapers carried the headline of a poor girl succeeding in an examination -  the story which motivates, the story which inspires, the story which unfortunately killed the girl! [1] The story I am talking about is of a girl from Kannur. She scored 1180/1200 in her HSS exam. But she committed suicide. The media gave her the kind of publicity she didn't want. She had been hiding her background from her classmates by choice. Media didn't bother about respecting her privacy, spiced the story up a bit and served a headline which grabbed eyeballs. The girl felt humiliated and committed suicide. For those who ha...

Once upon a time, in the land that gave zero, I met a person who had infinite worries. Before the narrative begins, let me introduce myself. I work as a recruiter at Mob. My job is to find people who are passionate about taking the law into their hands and take the society back to the stone age. I recently met an exceptional applicant during the recruitment process. He was a brilliant guy - he was worried about the cultural degradation, open celebration of love, and even better, people not agreeing with his views. As we don't care about privacy, here are excerpts from his interview which I believe I have the right to post. "So tell us something about yourself." - "My name is Chintan. I am 27 years old and I graduated from prison last year. Since then, I have been looking for an opening which goes along with my passion. Apart from this, I love forming half cooked opinions and imposing them." "That's impressive. Why were you in prison by the way?...

Eminent sociologist Professor M.N. Srinivas coined the term "Sanskritization" to describe the cultural mobility in the traditional caste structure of Indian society. To raise their status in the traditional hierarchy of society, lower castes imitated the ways of the upper castes and in the process, quit some of their "impure" ways to assimilate well. This assimilation continued throughout. During the British rule, several reform movements took place. When the reigns of these movements fell into the hands of the lower caste leaders, they questioned the need for the lower castes to imitate the ways of upper castes and rightly so. By blindly aping the ways of the upper rungs of the society, you also acknowledge their justification for being the upper class in the first place. I believe readers would agree with me here for the most part. Now that we have these ideas on the table, let's move to what's called westernization. With the advent of Europeans in ...

Bahadur Shah Zafar  was the last Mughal Emperor. Accompanied by his wife Zinat Mahal and 2 sons Mirza Jawan Bhakt and Mirza Shah Abbas and daughter-in-law Shah Zamani Begum (wife of Jawan Bhakt), he was sent to Rangoon after the revolt of 1857 had been crushed and that his where he died. Bahadur Shah died on Nov. 7, 1862, at the ripe old age of 87. By 1872 Shah Zamani Begum became completely blind. Mirza Shah Abbas married a girl from Rangoon, a daughter of a local Muslim merchant. His descendants  still live in Rangoon  today. Zinat Mahal lived on alone, comforting her loneliness with opium. She died in 1886. Her body was buried near her husband’s grave. A few years later Mirza Jawan Bakht died of stroke. He was 42. Here in India,  Sultana Begum  lives in a slum area of Kolkata off a pension of around INR 6,000 per month. She is the  wife of Prince Mirza Bedar Bukht, the great-grandson of Bahadur Shah Zafar  who was secretly broug...

"I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it." This quote is the focal point of liberalism which is based on the ideas of equality and liberty. There are different variants and schools of liberalism but the forementioned two ideas are more or less common to all, though to different degrees. Not anymore. Liberalism has taken a turn where ideas have to stick to the conformity of the boundaries laid by the upper echelons of liberals. The central ideas which seem to be approved are open world, no boundaries, no discrimination, appeasing minorities (religious, linguistic, sexual, racial amongst others). There is no room left for discussion, nor is any allowed. Take this for example. A recent incident in India involving Ms. Gurmehar Kaur stormed the nation. There were two sets of people, one presumably liberals who supported her call for peace and end of warmongering, and the other set which opposed her ideas. Both sides...

Ladies and Gentlemen, we are here with the famous YouTuber Firangi Gora and we intend to present his success story which is sure to inspire you. Firangi reacts to videos, which sounds really interesting. Let's see what he has got to say. "Good afternoon Firangi. We welcome you to our show .  How do you feel about this journey and eventual success of yours." Well, this has been a long journey. I started almost 5 months back with nothing. I happened to come across this trailer of a Bollywood movie while browsing, not to mention the old and terribly slow MacBook I had using since 8 months. So I watched it and thought it would be cool to upload my reaction to it. I was all meh. Next day, I realized the video had gone viral and it's been a heck of a journey since then. "Tell us more about your business model, this innovative stream you have opened up for others." It took me some time to perfect my business model. It sounds complicated but it is very ...