Saturday, February 6, 2016

My salute to Vatsalya Singh Chouhan and IIT Kharagpur

The Hindu published the news that Vatsalya Singh Chouhan, who is a son of a welder in Bihar has bagged a job with Microsoft with a starting annual salary of 1.02 crores. He is a student of IIT Kharagpur. Mr. Chouhan and his family must have struggled hard to achieve this success. I salute him for this success, as in India, boys and girls from poor economic and social background hardly get a chance to step on the stepping stone to success. They compete with children of affluent class who get everything on a platter because of their capacity to invest in education and grooming from very early stage of life.

Two teachers of Kota Coaching Centre, who mentored and motivated Mr. Singh deserve kudos. We should not undermine the contribution of IIT Kharagpur, which provides conducive environement and not a stifling environment, which stymie learning of students coming from the marginalised sections of the society.

Whenever, I read such a news, I realise that government institutions of excellence provide an opportunity to children of poor and lower middle class families to pursue higher education of substance and to leap frog to a life of more comfort and prosperity. They help to transform economically and socially marginalised families to empowered families creating great hopes for future generations. In those institutions merit and talent are recognised and teachers guide everyone without looking at his/her family or social background. Unfortunately, we do not have many such institutions. The government should strengthen those institutions which have the potential to become excellent and should not interfere with those which are doing well.

Private institutions of higher learning so far have failed to provide the same environment that are provided by institutions such as IIMs. IITs, ISIs, JNU, DU and IISc. Even, most government universities fail to provide that environment. Therefore, private investment in education might not be a substitute for government investment in creating centres for excellence.

Central and State governments should improve the quality of education in government schools in order to provide good education and groom  those who come from economically or socially marginalised families. 

2 comments:

  1. What star difference between Hyderabad Central University and IIT kharagpur. See.the stark diff. Rohit vemula at Hyd.university and Vatsalya Singh Chouhan atIIT Kharagpur. It is the institution that makes the diff.

    ReplyDelete
  2. What star difference between Hyderabad Central University and IIT kharagpur. See.the stark diff. Rohit vemula at Hyd.university and Vatsalya Singh Chouhan atIIT Kharagpur. It is the institution that makes the diff.

    ReplyDelete