Aims of Education

Any educational endevour should be clear about what its aims are. Here we look at some of the aims of popular efforts in India – Siksha-Satra propounded by Rabindranath Tagore, Nai Talim of Mahatma Gandhi, The National Curriculum Framework of 2005 and finally a list provided and justified by yours truly. In the coming Asha bi-annual conference I am planning to propose these aims and see how Asha would go about developing a strategy and implementation for achieving these aims.

Siksha Satra

1. Education should provide an environment and opportunity for children to exercise their natural desire for self-expansion and growth.
2. Education should provide skills in art, science and business to assist in self-preservation of individuals
3. Education should prepare individuals to operate effectively in the field of human service and citizenship. It should inculcate in individuals the capacity to understand and sympathize with their neighbors and hence function as a decent member of the human society. Through education of children entire neighborhoods can be rejuvenated for active self-governance.
4. Education, through art, should assist the individual in self-expression and imagination. It should provide the ability to expand the horizon through this imagination for spiritual abstraction and human welfare.
5. Through the above education should provide the basis for a renaissance of the countryside in India.

Nai Talim

1. The core aim of Basic Education is to help students to develop self-sufficiency. This self-sufficiency is not limited to the narrow sense of preservation, i.e. dependence on others for daily bread but also develop the power of acquiring knowledge for oneself and ability of individuals to rule themselves to control their senses and thoughts.
2. Basic education laid a strong emphasis on manual work. The belief was if everyone in society does most of the manual work required to sustain themselves materially, it would make society more just. Material production also involved co-operative and co-ordinated activity and thus education would also promote these important values.
3. Basic Education did not look at art as a separate area but as an integrated component within the physical work. Whether creating a pot or building a hut, adequate energy was spent on the aesthetic aspects. Doing a job well done and moving beyond the mere function and giving importance to the form was emphasised.

National Curriculum Framework

1. Education should aim to build a commitment to democracy and values of equality, justice, freedom, concern for other’s well being, secularism, respect for human dignity and rights.
2. Education should aim to build independence of thought and action and value-based decision making independently and collectively. It should make individuals capable of constructing knowledge independently by learning to learn and unlearn.
3. Education should aim to develop a social temper. It should help develop capabilities that would enable individuals to participate in democratic processes and economic processes. It should enable individual to find work not only for self-sustenance but also to contribute meaningfully in the socio-economic processes of the nation.
4. Education should encourage creativity and aesthetic appreciation. It not only provides creative avenues for self-expression but also guards against exploitation of aesthetic gullibility by vested interests.

Aims of Education - Thus Spake Ram

The essential aim of education is to provide the ability to persons to achieve their various needs – individually and collectively. The needs can be broadly categorized as physical, psychological, social and self-actualization. Good education should aim to create a disposition amongst students that would make satisfaction of these needs possible. Education should strive to create:

1. An introspective and confident being – Knowing and understanding oneself is an essential quality that a person requires to live in a community. Education should provide the opportunity and space for individuals to introspect and understand what kind of person they are, what their likes and dislikes are and what their capabilities and limitations are. Understanding and accepting oneself helps in acquiring self-confidence and one of the primary aims of education should be to help individuals be confident about themselves. The ability to introspect and evaluate oneself for the consequences of their actions and inactions is essential for harmonious communal living.
2. A knowledgeable being – To know about things around them is a natural curiosity that human beings possess. This curiosity needs to be encouraged systematically through education. Knowing what, how and why about things and events should be a habituated desire and the ability to find the source of such knowledge and assimilate it is essential if a person needs to understand the world around them and act accordingly. Education should aim at helping this ability to construct knowledge.
3. A rational and thinking being – The ability to reason and find rationale is critical to operate in a complex environment, which is what human society is. In a democratic society, force of custom or word of higher authority cannot be sufficient justification for a person’s actions and its consequences. Justifications have to be made based on logical reasoning that is acceptable to all. Science has made enormous progress to increase our understanding of the world around us and it is also based on reason and critical thinking. To create a scientific temper is an important aim of education.
4. An adaptive being – Self-sustenance is very important for any individual. But school education rather than teaching ‘a specific skill’ to its students should create the ability and disposition to learn skills as necessitated by changes in the external environment. Since change is constant, only those who adapt quickly and correctly to these changes would end up successful. Education should also go beyond providing mere adaptability; it should also enable individuals to be agents of change themselves.
5. An ethical and moral being – When capability is not followed up with ethics and morality, society is riven with injustice, inequality and strife. School education should help students explore the ethical and moral dilemmas and develop a social temper. How important is individual liberty? What is the balance between individual liberty and communal responsibility? Education should assist in at least making students think about these issues and finding satisfactory answers for themselves.
6. An aesthetic being – Humans have always aspired to transcend beyond the mundane through artistic expression. Ability to appreciate and participate in good art brings out so much joy in us that it is imperative that education brings out and develops this aesthetic temper amongst us. High art and literature may also temper our desires and acts as a curative in our ethical pursuits.

A society that consists of confident, knowledgable, rational, adaptive, ethical and aesthetic individuals would definitely be a more just and equitable one.

Systems Biology

There was a marked turnaround in my attitude towards science ever since I read Consilience. You can now call me a "Running Dog of Science" and so you can imagine my annoyance when the usual riff-raff wail about how science is reductionist and so cannot solve some of the important problems we face like our health and such. Ha! Even before the critique was fully understood by the critics themselves the erroneous approach has been rectified. Read the article in The Economist about "systems biology", it talks about the progress in a new area in Biology which has started to look at the body as a whole (system) rather than an individual cell or a part.
If the riff-raff didn't get it when science that was involved in the IPCC was not entirely reductionist, they might just get it now.
The thing about science, is that it does not believe that it is infallible, that it has The Final answer. So if and when criticisms arise they are observed, analysed and inferences drawn(avlokan, vishleshan, nishkarsh - my Hindi vocabulary has increased exponentially thanks to reading curriculum material of Prashika as part of our course) and path modifications are made accordingly. Let us find an other system which does it quicker and better and I would be a "Running Dog of That". Till then... let the sleeping dogs lie...zzzz...

Maximum City

The taxi and auto drivers in Mumbai have always amazed me. Unlike other cities they are extremely professional. You can get an auto or taxi anytime without any fuss (except, of course, at the railways station and airports where they act up). I had come late from TISS, as late as 1 at night, and all I had to do was tell the taxi driver where I needed to be dropped off. Being conditioned by Bangalore and Chennai I am always taken by surprise and still I don't accept it and I am expecting an unreasonable demand at the drop off point. But the driver just checks his rate card (for night rates) and the amount is paid.
The last couple of days I have had my experience further heightened. Kidwai Nagar, where I stay with my mom-in-law has a lot of taxies. This week two times I did not have change for 100 Rs. So, the first time I told the driver that I will pay him hundred and collect the change later. He was puzzled but accepted. The next day morning I collected the change from him. Today the same thing happened and instead the driver took my phone number. Later this evening he called my phone and asked me to come down and collect the change! I had not even bothered to remember his car number or anything. This is the maximum city where you can still trust the taxi wallas!

No national language

Second semester already! Three courses again

- Language, Mind and Society conducted by Rama Kant Agnihostri. Started off with linguistics and peek into the Indian constitution. Hindi is not a national language! Yo! Only an official language. I t was cute when a classmate claimed that 'There is no human being who has Hindi as a mother tongue'. Hmm.. what are the implications of such a statement... Out of the 25 in our class 20 are from Daaleee. You know there is a universal grammar of cvcvcv alternations. Can you think of a word with ccccv format? If you do please let me know..any language..

- Curriculum and School by Padma Sarangapani. We also had two lectures of Krishna Kumar of NCERT. Very interesting one about modernity in pedgagogy. This is guy is a thinker, no doubt. It was pleasurable interacting with him.

- First Language Pedagogy by Maxine Bernsten and Jane Sahi. Strangely both women are not of Indian origin but have chosen to be Indian citizens. Expecting it to be very interesting. Do you know why when two men who have Tulu as their first language prefer to speak in English? That way they will not disclose the class of society they come from and also will not have to worry whether to show respect to the other or not.

Another interesting fact - by the time a child is 4 they are an linguistic adult. I have deliberate lydecided to change the grammar to use plural instead of revealing the gender! Language is not a thing, you cannot reify it, it is a process after all...

Constructivism

After several years of deliberation on whether Asha Bangalore should fund physical infrastructure in government schools, it was finally decided to go ahead and build a compound wall around Chandranagar school and also fund for drinking water supply and additional bathrooms.

The government funds were not sufficient to build the compound wall and further the money spent towards it was able to create only a half-constructed wall. The teachers and students felt that a compound wall was an absolute necessity for the school considering the hostile local environment.

• There had been repeated instances of local youth loitering in the school premises and pestering the students.
• Tourists cars were also frequently parked in the school campus and sometimes disturbed the classrooms by playing loud music.
• The school play ground was unusable since it was used as a public garbage dump and latrine

Considering the above factors and also a hope that a more formal school space would improve the sense of a school amongst the students, Asha Bangalore has decided to go ahead and construct the wall.

Asha Bangalore has also been trying to get the parents to be more actively involved in the school issues, but the response has been lukewarm. The last time when a meeting was organized to go and demand additional teachers from the BEO only 20 parents (for 340 students) turned up. It was felt that Asha’s involvement was not visibly felt in the community and if we contribute to a visible asset may be it would motivate the parents to participate more. This theory is yet to be tested!

The construction started on Oct 9^th, 2007 and here are some photographs of the work in progress

Sump for drinking water (15000 litres)

Wall (to the right of entrance)

Wall (to the left of entrance)

God of learning!

Yesterday I was so pissed off that I didn’t go to school!

The Chandranagar school (where I teach) is a public space that is utilized for everything, including tying up cows, parking tourist vehicles (sometimes with music blearing out of them) and such. For the last 3 years Asha Bangalore has been trying to get a compound wall around the school so that there would be a sense of a separate school space within the community. The hope was that it would bring a notion of sanctity to that school space. We could have easily raised funds to get that wall built. But, as you all probably know by now, we don’t do things the easy way. We do it in a way so that we can complain and gripe about it, may be just so that we can get another blog entry!

We wanted the local ‘community’ to make some contribution towards this compound wall. All the usual reasoning like ‘ownership’ and ‘empowerment’ has been thrown around quite liberally in this context. For three years we have been trying, trying and trying. Recently one of the parents who happened to be a construction person even made an estimate of the costs for the wall, plus additional toilets and drinking water facility. It came to about a lakh of rupees. This included around 15000 of labour charge. Since many parents are construction workers we were trying to see if they can contribute labour in kind along with Asha volunteers (our volunteers have no skill in the construction industry or for that matter....). No movement... “how can we work for two days without wages”?

Yesterday I go to the school and I see this huge Ganesh pandal. So many lights and decorations and I asked the guy working on it how much did that cost. He said it was around 10,000 rupees. The local folks are quite happy about the pandal. I don’t think they paid that out of their pockets, some local politico-goonda must have. Nevertheless, why couldn’t they channel that to improving the school infrastructure? What do they expect this pandal would do to them? Do they really believe that Ganesha, god of learning, is going to help the children learn better? This country, I tell you...

In any case all this fretting and fuming (and blogging) has helped me calm down. With tail between my legs I am back to school today. Out of the 43 kids I teach may be one of them might find reason not to invest in Ganesha pandals, may be not... It seems like any focus on the end-result is a route to disaster. Just focus on the process...just focus on the process..

Muthu - II

For those who have been waiting with baited breath to hear what happened to Muthu, don’t worry..... nothing happened.... his mother just ‘forgot’ about our conversation....ooofff.

Muthu was ‘behaving’ fine for a couple of days before he started his antics once again. Last week I conducted a test (quiz) and made sure there were two sets of question papers so that the children don’t copy. Copying is prevalent and as natural as gravity in this school. I had told the children that the question papers are different and if they tried to copy it not only indicates their nefarious purpose but also exposes their stupidity!

Not so surprising, Muthu had copied two answers from his neighbor. I gave a 0 out of 20 and then while I was distributing the answer sheets, he was busy trying to gouge the eyes out of Maruthi (an extremely bright kid). I just lost it. I guess since the physical route was not available, I had decided to emotionally scar(e) him. I went near him and threatened to fall at his feet and plead with him. I told him that I had exhausted all other avenues of reaching out to him and the only way I can see now is pleading. There was so much emotional drama in the class, all students went “beda saar, beda saar”. Muthu started bawling, if I were he I would have prefered one tight slap...

Heroic Teachers

Will Oklin is a teacher (English and Photography) in Chicago school and he has blogged about his work. My mentor sent me this link and I thought it was a good read.

Muthu

Muthu is an 11-year boy studying in the 5^th standard in Government Higher Primary School, Chandaranagar, Bangalore. I have been teaching 5^th standard English and Maths for the 8 months (I taught them when they were in class 4 too). Muthu is an hyper-active kid and is always busy up to some mischief. But when paid individual attention he used to pick up things quite fast. This year his messing around in the class was even more. He either used to constantly fight with the kids around him or he used to fall asleep. For the last few weeks I was really wondering why is he falling asleep? Is he really very tired or worse is he sniffing some gum or something? He was not learning anything academically in the class and had started doing more crazier things like making faces at me when I turned my back towards the class (still unusual in 5^th standard, I am expecting that only in 7^th or so). I had wanted to talk to his parents and asked him if I can meet them. Both are construction workers and he said they are never around. His younger brother, Arun is also in the same class, but he is quite the opposite. He pays attention and picks up things very fast. He is a good student.

I used to complain to all the teachers about Muthu and even to some of my friends. I used to even joke that he is my nemesis and he comes and frightens me in my dreams.

Today his mother happened to come to the school. She came to complain that she say him roaming around the streets yesterday instead of coming to the school. I also complained to her that he is not paying attention in the class and was disrupting the class too. But I did not expect what was coming next. She produced a stout stick and said that we should thrash him more often. “He would listen only to some sound thrashing Sir. Look, we are like this (construction workers) because our mothers did not thrash us”. She also started beating him then and there. I felt miserable that I ratted on him. Ominously, she also threatened him “let your dad come back home today, you are going to be dead body only”. At that point I recovered a bit and told not to worry about him and I will talk to him. Since I am “English” teacher (who wears jeans and t-shirt) I get a little more leeway in this school, so I hope (dearly hope) she takes my word and leaves him alone. Man, I have resolved I will never complain about my kids, not even in a non-serious fashion.

After she left I had a long conversation with Muthu:

Ram: Whats up Muthu, why all this trouble?

Muthu: I don’t know sar.

R: How come you feel sleepy all the time, too much work at home?

M: No, sar.

R: Ok, what are the issues you are facing in the class, why did you skip school?

M: Everyone bothers me and talks to me and then I get caught. The students and teachers beat me and so I did not come to school

R: Do you beat the students too?

M: Yes :)

R: What do you do at home, when do you get up?

M: 6 am

R: What do you do after that?

M: I fold all the bedding

R: And then

M: I go and collect 10 pots of water. The distance is like between here and the bakery (around 300 meters).

R: And then

M: I cook food.

R: Doesn’t your mom cook?

M: No, she also leaves early. My dad leaves without eating. My mom does other work at home, eats and then leaves. So I do the cooking

R: What do you cook?

M: Rice and sambar. Some times sambar with just dal and sometimes with vegetables.

R: Do you like vegetables?

M:No

R: Don’t you like potatoes?

M:Yes :)

R: What else?

M: Potatoes and Bhendi (Okra)

R: Wow, I like potatoes and okra too. They are might favorite, in that order. We have things in common. Do you like bitter gourd?

M: Yes, also they say it helps in clearing your stomach of bugs.

R: What about nighttime?
M: I cook then too and have to get 2 to 4 pots of water.

R: Do your parents beat you?

M: My father gets drunk and beats me. He also beats my mother.

R: Why does he beat you?

M: When I don’t do my work. Like not getting the water.

R: Why don’t you do your work?

M: Because I have to study and all.

R: Yeah right, really tell me?

M: I also like to go out and play with the other kids outside :)

R: Hmm, that is not right beating you like that. Is it?

M: No, it is not right.

R: How come then you beat other kids?

M: !!!!! (silence... smile)

R:ok, lets come back to the classroom. What do you think can be done?

M:Everyone talks to me and bothers. When I talk back or hit back I get caught all the time.

R: Well, if you don’t sit in the back row it might not be a problem. Do you go to movies?

M:Sometimes

R: Where do you like to sit, in the back or in the front?

M: In the front

R: Why?

M: The screen looks big and I get excited :)

R: May be if you sit in the front in class also it might be exciting. Think of the class as the movie and think of the teacher as a hero or a heroine or a villain if you like (ha ha ha)

M: ha ha ha

R: Will you do that?

M: Yes I will sit in the front row from today.

We then had a math’s class and Muthu sat in the front and was very eager to participate in the class. He repeatedly attempted to answer questions though only a few times he was right. I hope this continues in the future too.

I was feeling quite bad that I was quite quick to judge this kid and complain about him. A 11 year old cooking and doing the housework. So much violence in his house. I think he would like to unwind in the school and his idea of doing that is horsing around and have some fun. Can we blame him? I have to be kinder and more patient with him. This also explained why Arun was doing better academically. He had a more relaxed life (comparatively).

That said, having 43 such kids in the class does test my patience. I don’t know how long all these nice feelings will last before I go back to my....

Such a Long Journey

It has been almost ten days since I returned from my trip to Ladakh and I have still not posted anything about my travel. Since several of my fans have expressed they could not wait any longer I am forced to write in short bursts whenever I find time. (Some may wonder what is it that keeps me that busy, but we would not get into that now)

We left Bangalore on June 13^th 2200 hours and reached Alchi (a monastery 60 kms to the west of Leh on the Srinagar-Leh highway) on June 19^th 15 hours. It was a 137-hour journey, I am sure Armstrong’s journey to the moon was much shorter but I am equally sure that the scenery on the way must have been no more spectacular.

June 13^th – 2200 Boarded Sampark Kranthi express leaving Bangalore from the Yeshwantpur station, a long commute by auto-rickshaw

June 14^th – The train journey was to be utilized studiously by pouring over philosophy, sociology and psychology of education. Instead concentrated on the food that was packed for the journey, which spoilt by the afternoon. So, fretted and worried about the next meal after each meal. As Douglas Adams aptly put it, the best way to deal with an uncomfortable situation is to frown a lot and go to sleep. So did a lot of both.

June 15^th – Reached Dalli in the morning. Had a bath and ate lunch at Arati’s (my traveling partner) sister’s place. I packed and unpacked my backpack so many times that we barely made it to the New Delhi station in time to catch Shalimar Express (4645). We were running with our heavy backpacks on the pedestrian over bridge and realized that the staircase to our platform was closed. We got off at the next one and got down on the tracks with all its muck and clambered up again to reach the train (yikes). Don’t get enamored by its name, Shalimar is a cattle-cart. It was one hell of a journey in that train packed like sardines with 8 other broad-shouldered jawans all heading to the troubled state of Jammu and Kashmir. All 10 of us in our compartment were either from Karnataka or Tamil Nadu, so I read Junior Vikatan on the way from Delhi to Jammu. It was sad to see so many young lives (all were in their early 20s) wasted in a totally unnecessary ‘conflict’. May be if both our countries should have conscription and when every family sends it young ones to the front sense and hence peace would prevail.

June 16^th – Reached Jammu bright and early at 1000 hours. The scheduled arrival was 0530 but no one other than us was surprised a bit. We missed the buses to Srinagar and so had to share a Sumo with 5 others to Srinagar. 4 of them were again army folks and the driver, Salim, was a spirited Kashmiri. The faujis were tense about the late start and wanted to reach the valley before dark. Salim could sense their unease and did everything possible to slow the journey. Thanks to him we had a fantastic rajma-chawal lunch in a relaxed pace. The road trip was great with nice views and was littered with vehicles that had missed the road altogether and plunged into the gorges and ravines. We got furthered delayed when the road was closed briefly to pick up one such wrecked car.

A wrecked car extricated and as always it is a good tamasha for everyone

By the time we reached Srinagar it was 2100 hours. We were politely informed in the bus station that 17^th being a Sunday there were no buses to Leh since they did blasting on the highway. Sounded as if India and Pakistan armies worked only on Sunday and did some uninterested shelling of each other’s territories on that day. My travel partner was slowly getting to know me better, especially my planning capabilities. So we had a day to chill-out in Srinagar.

June 17^th – A houseboat sounded appropriate for the night stay but it was just a shack. The only nice part was the morning spent in the verandah viewing the Dal (pronounced as dull) Lake and the vendors in their shikaras peddling their wares. I surprised myself and bought jewelry from one of them.

Buying jewelry on the houseboat verandah

We had enough of the boat when I heard obnoxious splashes when the bathroom was getting used. The sewage goes right into the lake from all the houseboats. So we decided that we would move to a guesthouse and at least the sewage is then centralized and if we are of an optimistic bent of mind we can even think that it would be treated before getting released in the Jhelum. The owner of the houseboat had sent his daughter in shikara to paddle us out and it was a very dreamy Kashmiri sequence, a pretty Kashmiri girl paddling the boat with me sitting on it. She was chitchatting in a friendly manner but the dream was rudely brought to an end when she asked “uncle, aap kahan se aaye ho”? It must have been my white stubble, so I promptly shaved that night.

Definitely not dull in any way

We did the usual rounds of Srinagar, the Mughal gardens, Hazratbal mosque and Jamia Masjid. The Jamia Masjid is a must see. Unusual for a mosque, it is constructed of wood with full cedar trees acting as columns.

Jamia Masjid, Srinagar - A differently shaped mosque with cedar columns

We finished the day with a fantastic Kashmiri dinner at Adhoos. There was a korma made out of lotus stems that was very unique and very tasty. Though there were a crazy amount of army men all over, Srinagar seemed reasonable safe. The town was very active though the touts are aggressive and annoying. We booked tickets on a Semi-luxury bus to Leh and settled into a guesthouse overlooking Jhelum for the night.

A Kashmiri family at the mosque, when shown the picture she said "behathareen". Urdu is so much more poetic than Hindi, "accha" sounds so flat.

The next post would be on our bus journey from Srinagar to Leh. Till then...

M.A. in Elementary Education

It has been a while since I made an entry. Thanks for your patience. It might be hard for you to believe but I have been actually kinda busy these days. In a moment of madness I had reasoned that I require higher education on the education front and hence enrolled in M.A. in Elementary Education offered by Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai and I now don’t regret it at all. It has been a fantastic 3 weeks in Mumbai.

It is a 2 years with 4 semesters, each having a month of contact classes in Mumbai and rest of which can be done online. It is far more rigorous than I ever expected with 3 assignments to be submitted every month. So it is not really like a correspondence course. Through special software we are expected to continue our discussions with the faculty online throughout the course. The three courses in the first semester are Philosophy of Education (PoE), Sociology of Education (SoE), Child Development Cognition and Learning (CDCL).

PoE as the name suggests is a broad philosophical analysis of role of education, its aims etc. The course is being jointly offered by Rohit Dhankar of Digantar and Alok Mathur of Rishi Valley (Krisnamurthy Foundation). It has been an excellent course. They have been very careful to provide us just with aids and readings such that ‘a philosophy’ is not thrusted down our throat but we develop the capability to philosophise. Our first reading was from the concluding chapter of John Dewey’s book Democracy and Education. This book is a must read for anyone interested in the field of school education. There have been other readings from Dearden, Hamlyn, Logic and Ten Theories of Human Nature. Though the readings have been heavy I have enjoyed them very much.

SoE is two-semester course and expects to give the students an understanding of the relationship between the society and education. We have so far dwelved to some Sociology basics like Social Struture, Sociological Imagination, Social Stratification, different theories like the functionalism, conflict-theory (Marx) etc. It has been quite illuminating and some of the readings have also been very interesting. Currently I am reading some chapters from the selected works of B.R.Ambedkar and his views on caste along with Andre Betelie on Caste, Class and Power. There have been lively discussions in the class (19 out of the 25 are women) about gender and education. Reading from Kamala Bhasin on gender issues is good.

CDCL has a lot to do with child psychology and theories of learning. We were introduced to

• Behavorism by Pavlov, Skinner and Gestalt
• Construtivism by Piaget
• Social constructivism by Vygotsky
• Information Processing

CDCL also covers aspects like nutrition and child development and how self is constructed. I have to read Erikkson’s theory in this subject and then read a autobiography (I am planning to read K.M.Panniker’s) and analyse how he has constructed his self. Shouldn’t that be interesting?

Sour Grapes

The more I see Australia play and less I hear them talk I have to admit that they deserve to take this cup ..... until I switch back to watching Murali. Then the intellect is quietly packed away and pure emotion taketh over..... GO SRI LANKA... do the unthinkable (and probably undoable).

More realistically speaking, if there is a team that can at least pose a few questions it is them. SL has to play first, score 250+ and then quickly dismiss Ponting (it doesn't matter who gets out first Gilchrist or Hayden). Then at least they build pressure. Obviously, the game would not be over still but with Murali tightening the screws and Malinga providing the variety there is a good chance for Sri Lanka.

It is not my bias, I don't think Australia bowled exceptionally well during the semis. It was more a case of self-destruction from SA. Definitely it is not easy to score 300 with Australia, but teams other than SL have such a mediocre bowling attack that they had no option but to try and perish in that effort. The most underrated bowler in this tournament is Brad Hogg and during the Sri Lankan innings it would be crucial that their batsmen give him the due respect. I have a feeling that if the SL batting collapses it would be more due to Hogg than the other bowlers. Tait has been improving each game, it is amazing how the Australians are always improving.

The umpiring standard in the first semi-final was atrocious. The two decisions, one thick inside edge and the second leaving the leg stump by miles were really bad. Thank god the umpires were not Asian, otherwise there would have been snide comments from the chatteratti about Asain capabilities.

Peter Roebuck had written an atrocious article in which he says "Pakistan must be banned from international cricket for five years. If Bob Woolmer was indeed murdered by corrupt players, then they should be ousted for a decade. What has been their contribution since Imran Khan left the scene? Ball tampering, match fixing, zealotry, chucking, steroid taking and tantrum throwing."

If you look at the list of litanies probably every one of these accusations (what does he mean zealotry? growing beards?) applies to one or another Australian player in some point of time. Warne was suspended for drug abuse, Warne again for match fixing along with Mark Waugh, Lee's and Tait's fast balls are as close as Akhtar's in terms of action. Ball tampering charges were not proved, does he read the papers at all. In the recent debacle in England, Pakistan had come clean! Such unabashed racism! In a world where winning is all that matters, if Australia behaved the same way in the pitch as they do now and were losing, people would have come down heavily on them for their on field behavior.

May be they should have a coaching session from Roger Federer on behavior, on and off the field. Good behavior doesn't mean that you are loser. I guess if they stop aping the US and start getting an identity of their own they might improve in that department.

(Is all this griping a question of sour grapes? :) )

Oh Murali!

The torchlight eyes and the spectacular smile makes cricket all the more worth watching. For me, the moment of the first semi-final was when Murali took a diving catch of a Styris scoop and jump in sheer joy only to realize it was a no-ball. His facial expressions changed not to disgust but just muttering under his breath. It was just fantastic. You can keep watching this man play, it reminds me of the old West Indians, sheer joy. Somehow one does not get the same feeling when the Australians or South Africans triumph, it is more clinical and definitely superior but not joyful.

An earlier Murali moment was when he took KP's wicket against England. A beautiful doosra, a good catch and a priceless expression. I am sure even without these powerful TV cameras Murali's eyes would have been caught back in 1983. It is not just about winning or losing but how you play the game. Sadly, I don't see any Indian cricketer do that any more. I guess the endorsements are back in their mind all the time. With West Indies in terminal decline and Pakistan in shambles and the rest only clinical, we had to look for some joy in the inconsistent Bangladeshi tigers and of course the Sri Lankans. But Murali is the only beacon of hope in this cup.

I have to admit I was hopeful of Freddie Flintoff. After a long time it appeared that a true cricketer was emerging out of England, Kapil/Botham style. But he was very disappointing in this series. It would be good for world cricket if he bounces back. Another loss was Brett Lee. A cricketer whom I enjoy watching. There is something about their attitude and how they play their game which is more appealing to me than their actual performance. McGrath is any day better than Lee but I would prefer the latter any time.

I guess Murali's action is definitely suspect, but I will set all aside just for his personality and attitude in the field. Go Murali, make cricket worth watching..

P.S. - It is sad to see here that most Indians have stopped watching the game after India was out. Young boys were playing outside when Jayawardene was building one of the classic innings in the game. I don't see much hope in Indian cricket improving....

Summer Camp

The schools are closed for the summer vacation. This year the Karnataka government has decided that they would provide the noon-meals even during the vacation time! So the teachers are expected to come during the summer vacation and keep the schools open. I have taken this opportunity to have a kind of summer camp for the children with more informal sessions. The government’s plan is, as usual, not very well thought. There are around 25 students (out of almost 300) who turn up. The meal provider has so far (it has been one week) not provided the noon meals.

I now handle 10 children and it is lot more enjoyable. There is direct interaction with each and every child and I am not playing any policing role at all. We still do English and Math. I bought these bi-lingual picture books from Tulika, which has both English and Kannada on the same page. The idea is that the children would read the Kannada and know the story and I would help them read the English bits and slowly they would be more comfortable reading and speaking English. I also work on Math using the decimal blocks and Cuisenaire rods.

Since the class strength is reasonable, we have lot of conversations outside and along with the teaching/learning. Here are some snippets:

Dogs

Out of the 10 students almost all of them have been chased or attacked by stray dogs. 3 of them have actually been bitten and had to get those horrible injections for rabies. Anyone in Bangalore or even outside of it would have heard of the recent happenings in this context. The dogs are a serious health problem and I really don’t understand these “animal lovers”. Do they let cockroaches roam in their houses and not kill them? Are dogs endangered? Would they upset the ecological balance? Just cull them. It is nice to sit in houses with security gates and travel in cars and wax eloquent about their concern for dogs. Let their children be chased every day by dogs and be bitten by them and then I would like to hear from them.

Mobile Phones

All their families have mobile phones. Some families have more than one. Most of the children remember the 10-digit number of the phones in their families.

Private Schools

There are 3 children who come to my summer class from private schools in that area. They belong to the same socio-economic background as the other children. Two go to “Blossom” school. They have better capability than the government school children but only marginally. A class 6 student, Annapurna, who has supposedly learnt English from class 1 can just about read a simple English book. But her attitude was amazing. She took the book back home, worked on it hard and the next day could fluently read it. This is very different from the government school kids. Though I have given them the books for a week, I doubt any of them even open the books at home. This drive to perform could definitely be seen in the private school children. Another kid, Hemanth, goes to “Orchid” private school. He is in the 1^st class and he is very good! He can already read simple English books. His brother Manjunath, who just finished 4^th class in the government school, can barely read English. Seeing the difference in performance from the same family but in different systems makes me wonder if I should re-calibrate my opinion on private schools, at least in the urban slum context. For "Blossom" the kids pay Rs.85 per month and a Rs.750 donation. I was not able to find out how much is the fees in "Orchid".

Lords

“Rent seeking generally implies the extraction of uncompensated value from others without making any contribution to productivity .....”

I guess Indian cricket gives a new connotation to Lords. The so-called senior players are more like rent seeking feudal lords than professional cricketers. I am amazed at several comments about how Tendulkar should decide when he should quit, till then he should be kept in the team! If this is not feudal, hierarchical mind-set what else do you call it? I guess in a country where hierarchy has religio-social sanction through its caste system and enforced by the system of marriage, you can’t expect anything better. Under the guise of ‘respect’ for seniors we are just continuing to sing paeans to hierarchy. Current performance does not count. The results are obvious. The Australian team has shown what professionalism and performance is all about. For all our flirtations with modernity we remain fundamentally a feudal nation.

It was most satisfying to see India kicked out of the tournament in the first stage. With 16 teams playing we could not figure in the top 8. It is not cricket anymore; it is a huge joint venture between BCCI-Product Advertisers-Players. The game is secondary. Otherwise how can we justify the ‘blue billion’ hype of winning world cup for a team which was ranked 6^th! The posters and banners popping in Bangalore wishing the team good luck along with the photo of the local politician (goonda) were intolerable. The same organizations, which have spent money on this, would balk if they had to do some awareness campaigns on issues that really matter like sanitation and health (polio campaigns or bird-flu). Hype took precedence to actual performance.

With the trash out we can now watch some real cricket and we got it in that beautiful innings of Jayasurya against West Indies. He started watchfully after two quick wickets. Got a good look at the pitch and bowlers and then in his inimitable style just took the bowlers to the cleaners. Now, this is performance.

Well, there is another hype that will bust soon. A year or two back I was in IIT-Powai interviewing computer science students. One said his favorite subject was Algorithms, I asked what work he has done on that and he answered that he wrote a library information system. Get it?

A Fine Balance

“It is a fine balance between despair and hope” - Rohinton Mistry. In my opinion, this pretty much sums up life in India.

Hope – There is now a sleeper bus to Bijapur. It costs 400 Rupees one way but I could stretch my legs and try to sleep during the twelve-hour overnight journey from Bangalore to Bijapur. Bijapur seems to be a happening enough place for people to go to in sleeper buses.

Despair – The bus turns up 3 hours late. I was supposed to leave Bangalore by 7.15 pm and I actually left around 10.30.

Hope (mini) – The bus reached Bijapur by the scheduled arrival time of 8 am in the morning. So those 3 hours was just a buffer in their planning. The VRL travels probably allows for more buffer in their schedules than any of the famed software companies. May be our software tycoons should travel more in VRL buses to understand the concept of planning and scheduling.

Hope – The Shikshana Vahini program run by SVYM and supported by Asha has an ambitious goal of enabling all the SDMCs in Bijapur district by 2010. The team (of 5 people) seems to be very dedicated and energetic. Rather than simply running a school for around 200 children, Mamatha of SVYM has immersed herself in the un-enviable task of enabling the local communities to take ownership of the performance of their neighborhood schools funded by the government.

Despair – This trip only reaffirmed my opinion that it is easy to spout “community involvement” as an inane mantra but in reality it is a back and soul breaking effort. The program has been operational for 18 months. We visited 3 schools and met the SDMC and the teachers. There seems to be no ownership from the SDMC. The strong message from them is that the teachers are paid and so everything, including getting the children to school, is the teacher’s job. It is strange to hear from parents that they would not spend any effort in sending their wards to school but the teachers would have to run around every day to round up the children in the village and get them into the school. The schools are badly understaffed. Pressure on the BEOs (block education officers) is not working. The schools are in a moribund shape.

Despair (untrammelled) – Child marriage is still very prevalent in Bijapur! In every class I visited there were at least 2 or 3 girls who were already married. We are talking about elementary school here, 3^rd and 4^th grades. I didn’t have the heart to ask if they were married to adults or children. Some continue to live with their parents after the “marriage” and others actually live with their in-laws. If the civil society has not been able to stop this pernicious practice after 50 long years, do we really have hope about quality education and such esoteric stuff?

Hope (am I trying hard here?) – The SVYM team fully understands the current status and its implications. There was a very open and involved discussion on how to change track and tactics to be more effective. I was absolutely amazed at the energy and verve shown by two Asha Silicon Valley volunteers, Padma and Kiran, with whom I was traveling. They have come for a few weeks vacation from the US and in spite of the pressures to meet and spend time with family they took considerable time off to travel to these “projects”. I can’t stop gushing about them. They are ultra marathon runners and they hold Indian records. They have raised phenomenal amount of money through their running for Asha. Even if we consider all this as to be expected, the mental effort they spent in understanding the situation (in such a short time) and working with the SVYM team to find solutions does give hope. Does it not?

Do we really have a choice otherwise?

Pinch Me!

It has been a while since I have been in Bangalore for a reasonable duration. It was Chennai during Dec-Jan. A nice trip to Vishakapatnam (I would highly recommend that town, go forth and move there and make it another Bangalore, please...), Orissa and then longish trips to Lucknow, Kanpur and a brief but nice stop in Goa on the way back.

Something has changed in Bangalore. It seems to be getting better. Am in a dream? Or is it that as further time has elapsed since my regular agony of commuting through Hosur road to Electronic City I seem to be in a better mood in general to deal with Bangalore traffic?

Day before I had to drop someone to the railway station at 8 in the evening. Peak hour. But it took only 35 minutes for the 12 kms! Amazing isn't it? H.D.Kumaraswamy is making all the right noises of hauling up the recalcitrant bureaucracy, is he really serious about it? Is it showing effect?... I am still not able to believe this...

Well it is not an isolated case. For all the hype about the turn around of the Indian Railways, it does seem really true. I have been using the railways heavily in the recent past. I had shuddered to think of traveling in sleeper class to the badlands of UP. But it was indeed not so unpleasant. Trains run reasonably on time (The Farakkah Express was only 4 hours late, it was usually expected to be around 12 hours, so massive progress there). The food from the pantry car is actually hygienic and tastes reasonable. I did not fall sick after having more than 10 railway meals in a span of a week. I was stunned when the fellow from the pantry car came to me with a feedback form! The stations are clean. What is going on?

Are we seeing a new vigour in public administration or am I just day dreaming?

No more relevant

There have been some constant pursuits for humanity ever since it moved into ‘civilization’ from being a hunter-gatherer society.

- The need to know. Intellectual curiosity of how certain things happen and why do they happen and such questions.

- The need for social order. When we (ok, most of us) moved from to a ‘civilized’ society there was a need for maintaining social order (whether it was just or not is debatable, in fact it was usually unjust). But order was required nevertheless, some rules of the game for living together. This part also includes morality and ethics.

- The desire for transcendence or can I say feeling ‘high’. That thing which goes beyond the mundane.

Historically, religion has played a largely successful role in satisfying these needs to humanity. Religion has also aided in our lack of humility. If one can be humble enough to accept one’s ignorance and boldly claim ‘I don’t know’ I think religion is irrelevant in this age. Let me try and explain.

We will take up social order first. Democracy and the related institutions like the law enforcement and judiciary have taken up this role and performed much more effectively than any religious code. For any liberal minded person there is no question about this. Of course there are a large number of folks who believe (rather blindly) that Sharia is a much better code but they don’t let anyone argue against it! Morality and ethics are secular and not necessarily religious. Even in ancient times either in Greek philosophy or in Tamil Purananooru ethics have been elaborated without any religious undertones. To think that only religion maintains a moral society is very naïve. In fact the evidence is entirely contrary.

The method of science is a far better system to satisfy our intellectual curiosity than religion. This is where the crucial ‘I don’t know’ comes into play. Religion becomes irrelevant if you can acknowledge ‘I don’t know’ for things you really don’t ‘know’. The standard retort against science is that it does not have answers for everything. Of course, it definitely does not have answers for everything; otherwise there would not be scientist anymore in pursuit of those answers. I don’t know why certain things happen or don’t happen, I would rather say ‘I don’t know’ than say that it is God who is making certain things happen or not happen. I am not resting when I say ‘I don’t know’. That admittance is the starting point for finding out that answer. And science seems to provide the most reliable method to seek than answer.

For transcendence there is art and sport. The high you get, unless aided my substances that alter the brain-chemistry, is usually due to that total ‘living in the moment’. Getting immersed in music or appreciating poetry or literature or enjoying a terrific game of badminton lets you have this pleasure too!

Religion definitely had a role to play in different stages of our history and filled in where institutions were lacking and provided answers where better methods for seeking answers were not discovered yet. But now it is only intelligent that we are not just creatures of habit and leave religion for museums.

Helmet Reactions

“cycalge helmetaa? Idu enappa hosa ishtylu?”

A new cycle has been bought and I have started cycling to the school again. Since it is going to be a regular commute for me, my dear wife insists that I should wear a helmet (a cycle helmet which we brought back from the US 4 years back). And so I did. These are the reactions to a helmet wearing cyclist :

Road side adult idlers – (In these parts of the world a large proportion of the population belongs to this category). Curious and sometimes amused.

Young children – Total entertainment. They point to the other young children and giggle out loud.

Young male adults – Seemed pretty impressed with all the gadgetry and were checking out the cycle

Young female adults – Totally unimpressed with the cycle, the helmet and the cyclist. Now I know the real reason why Madhavi insists on a helmet.

Automobile drivers – This is the good part. The previous month I cycled without a helmet and so can tell the difference. They take a helmet wearing cyclist more seriously. This can’t be a working class cyclist who can’t afford anything better. This has to be a US returned software engineer with wonky ideas. So better treat him carefully. Just for this I would recommend helmets for all bangalore cyclists.

Call center drivers – I actually got a cat call from a call center driver. “How arrre ya?” in a very american accent!

Three camels – not only they utterly ignored me but even seemed to put on a disdainful look

Children in school – Loud laughing, “cycalge yaake helmetu?” was said out loud and “Raamu saaru solpa loosu” not so loud.

Teachers in school – Same as above except they kept their thoughts to themselves and had a good laugh after I left.

Value of Education

I have high blood pressure; my diastolic pressure is usually above 90. After a lot of diagnostic tests the doctors say it is due to a kidney condition. But I have my doubts. I think my pressure shoots up when I hear the following two arguments and let me tell you why.

1. Asha has a lofty goal of ‘catalyzing socio-economic change through education’. I repeatedly keep hearing from several volunteers, some of whom who have been in this racket for almost a decade, that even after ‘n’ years of running a school things have not changed. I think they are forgetting elementary logic. Education is a necessary condition for development but not sufficient. Do I need to explain more? I am actually not able to!
2. The second peeve I have is the narrow focus on only the instrumental value of education. There are educated who are un-employed, so why do we need education? This argument completely ignores or does not even recognize the existence of the intrinsic value for education. I take, some would think an extreme, position that basic education is an end in itself; it is not a means to an end. When I make this statement I will have to qualify what I think ‘basic education’ is. So let me jot it down as succinctly as possible:
1. Ability to read, write, comprehend
2. A good foundation in basic computational skills (arithmetic) and ability to form abstractions out of concrete situations (mathematics helps a lot in forming abstractions)
3. A good foundation in science as a tool for critical thinking. The aspect of science through inquiry and questioning in a systematic fashion and the acceptance of ‘truths’ through experimentation, which is repeatable and transparent (not because somebody or something said so or because that is what is being done before). The ability to questions ‘why’ and ‘how’ for almost everything and acquiring means to either comprehend answers that have already been found or acquiring ability to systematically approach those answers.
4. The applied part of the previous section in terms of problem solving techniques. ‘What is thinking’, ‘Is there a systematic way to think’, ‘Is there a common pattern in problem solving in general’.
5. Logic
6. A good grounding in social sciences. Understanding human history and questioning past events and their relevance to today’s life. Economics and the various social systems, their philosophies and how they affect societies.

The ultimate aim of ‘basic education’ is to create an autonomous thinking individual who can critically analyze problems and have some basic techniques of problem solving. (I might have missed out several things since I am writing this when my blood pressure is high. But in general I feel basic education should include things that affects the individual’s life in a day-to-day situation).

I am borrowing thoughts from a wise man (I need to introduce him in a better way later) here. What defines and refines humans is appreciation of beauty. Beauty when felt is pleasure, beauty when acted out is kindness and beauty when understood is realization. He opined, and I concur, that the best training for appreciating beauty that is available to all is literature. How can literature be absorbed without literacy? How can we put an instrumental value to this?

A lot of folks have unrealistic expectation out of education from a different angle. They expect it to answer the question ‘How to be a good human being’ or ‘How to be happy’. I think they are trying to play god here (even though some of them are avowed atheists!). Is there really a sure shot formula for that? I guess only the rabidly religious folks claim that there is an answer. May be on the other hand I believe, in true advaitic tradition, that god is within everyone. The individual best addresses the fundamental problems and there is no external formula for that solution.

While I am complaining about annoyances, I will state another high BP argument. When questioned about spending habits of the poor for e.g. wedding expenses there is an argument that why we are questioning only them and not the rich who spend on extravagant weddings too. If the arguer has some grounding in economics and understands the concept of diminishing marginal utility they would not be making this argument. For a person with a crore of money 1 lakh may not be of great value but for a person with only 1 lakh it is everything. Usually the poor don’t even have that, they borrow to spend which does not make economic sense at all! But then usually arguers hide behind cultural apologies (because it is how it was done before), without questioning why. Lot of well meaning and liberal folks do probably a lot more damage by apologizing for situations, which do not warranty them.

Ok, I am calming down now….