Commercialisation of Education – The Hindrance for Superpower India

Let New India arise out of the peasants’ cottage, grasping the plough; out of the huts of the fishermen, the cobbler, and the sweeper. Let her spring from the grocer’s shop, from beside the oven of the fritter-seller. Let her emanate from the factory, from marts, and from markets. Let her emerge from groves and forests, from hills and mountains.

                                                                                        --- Swami Vivekananda

Once I was reading an article and there I found some exciting data on India “Today over 35% of the population is below the age of 20. By 2020 it is expected that around 32.5 crores (325 million) of people will reach the working age which will be the largest in the world and this will come at a time when rest of the developed world will be faced with the ageing population. It is estimated that by 2020, US will be short of 17 million of working age, China by 10 million, Japan by 9 million and Russia by 6 million. At the same time India will have surplus of 47 million working age.” To check the accuracy of this, I started to Google in different ways and found similar data from other different sources.

Next day I was casually turning over the pages of the quotation book of Swami Vivekananda and I read the above words of him on how the India should arise including all sections of the society. For some time I kept on thinking between the Swamiji’s words and India’s population structure by age. My analysis led me to conclude that this is the apt time for India to become a superpower and the most developed nation of the world before we breathe our last and we can very well become part of this transformation.

I thought that education can play an essential role here but at the same time I think that the current situation of education can also become a big hindrance for us.

Education plays the most fundamental role for the growth of a nation. It is only the quality education which leads to a civilised family, society and a prosperous country with a booming economy.

Currently, the higher education in India is becoming a distant dream for most of the economically middle and poor class families. A huge part of the savings is spent on the tuition fee of the universities and colleges of India. Most of the students pursuing higher education are already on the pre burden of educational loans. In metro cities, the primary and secondary educations are also extremely expensive. If this trend continues then we cannot hope and expect that all the sections of the society can get proper access to education.

When our government was not able to take care of the education from the government’s expenses, they brought private players in to the picture. Now many Colleges and Universities are run by private institutions or individuals and this has made the educational sector as a commercial sector of India. Here the main focus is not to provide quality education but to extract maximum money. Even the government’s contribution of funds is not sufficient to run government colleges and eventually the monetary burden comes on the students and their parents.

As India is still coming out from poverty and backwardness, the main expectation from higher education is mainly a medium which can provide good salaried job to them and can help them in getting rid of economical problems. When a child gets admission call from so many colleges after the entrance result, they and their parents first inquire about the placements which college can provide to them. Rarely any one inquires about the quality of faculties and education provided. It may take 2 or 3 generations when Indian students will go for higher education mainly to show their creativity and innovation or to fulfil their real dreams. Almost 99% of the Indian students pursuing higher education have the main aim of getting good salaried jobs. Understanding this mindset of the people, private institutions approach the corporate world, for the job placements, and then charges huge amount of fees. There is no need to work hard to clear the semester examination as most of the questions will be out and the evaluation of the papers will happen internally.

There are many young students who are ready to work hard and study but they cannot go beyond secondary education as they are not having economical support. They cannot get the loans from the bank as the bank demands some guarantor and financial securities. The percentages of such people are not less as some of the survey tells that around 70% of the educated youth do not go to colleges.  There are good percentages of people who cannot even afford the secondary education. They end up in doing small jobs and their hard work and earnings never come and counted in the growth of India’s economy.

Under these conditions we cannot see India emerging as developed and superpower nation. Providing quality education to all is more the responsibility of government than each parent. But I will say that we should not wait and watch to see some nice policies from our government on the educational reforms. Already there are lot of policies but the impact is not visible on the ground. Here I will not discuss what the our government can do in this direction but yes how we as an individual can contribute more and more in this direction.

We can make our contributions in various ways like

• We can contribute through NGO in spreading education; can contribute in the  construction of schools and colleges on one’s own level.
• We can take the financial responsibility of at least one orphanage student from any NGO.
• We can make regular visits to some schools and colleges to take some classes for free of cost. We can take the computer classes for free for which they are charged in huge amount.
• Helping the needy children with books, notebooks etc. We should take moral responsibility that from my own village each and every kid is enrolled for the school. If not, we can make the parents aware and help them for the same.

There can be many more other ways we can make big or small impact in this direction.

India is known as young country because around 50% of the India’s current population is below the age of 25 and around 65% is below the age of 35 and so India will remain as youth country for another 30-50 years. The work forces in other countries are declining sharply and their government’s expenditure is increasing on providing healthcare facilities. More and more people are coming under the category of pensioners. For us, this is the best time to channelize the energy of youth, kids and children in the proper directions.

In case the energy of youths and children are not channelized in the proper direction to get the economic stability then the unemployment and frustrations may lead to criminalization, loot, robbery, gang war and so many. If this time is not utilised, then there is a chance that India can go back to 20-30 or 50 years ago in terms of development. If such a strong and huge youth force is left starving on their own when some will be leading a luxurious life in front of them, then it will increase all illegal and criminal activities. More and more will become part of Maoism and Naxalism or any other such groups.

Once again I will say that we need to awaken the sleeping India from each and every corner of our society and I can say with confidence that “If this India wakes up, the world will tremble.” 

I would like to conclude here with the words of Swami Vivekananda on the responsibilities which lie on us.

“Arise, awake, for your country needs this tremendous sacrifice. It is the young men that will do it. The Young, the energetic, the strong, the well-built, the intellectual for them is the task.”

“So long as the millions live in hunger and ignorance, I hold every man a traitor who have been educated at their expenses, pays not the least heed to them!”

“Get up, and put your shoulders to the wheel-how long is this life for? As you have come in to this world, leave some mark behind. Otherwise, where is the difference between you and the trees and stones? They too come in to existence, decay and die.”

“Let us all work hard, my brethren; this is no time for sleep. On our work depends the coming of the India of the future. She is there ready waiting. She is only sleeping. Arise and awake, and see her seated here, on her eternal throne, rejuvenated, more glorious than she ever was-this Motherland of ours.”