October 17, 2011

Dakshina Kannada district has been witnessing a considerable amount of rise in the number of educational institutions over the years. It is a matter of pride that this district has one of the highest number of engineering, medical, management and technical institutions, which even some of the states do not have. The share of private educational institutions is larger compared to Government-run institutions in the district. Some of the educational institutions have been existing in the district for more than 100 years and are recognised for their meritorious standards of education. There is no doubt that in the future the number of educational institutions is going to increase as many more students opt for higher education.

These developments are certainly welcomed as the younger generation needs more and more comprehensive knowledge. Amidst all this one worrying factor of this situation is that there are many educational institutions grabbing this opportunity to make a quick buck. They are literally playing with the future of students and bargaining with the sanctity of the education for money. In the long run the students of these institutions would be a bane to the society and will not be in an employable mode. Who is responsible for all this? Can we say greed for money against the future of the country?

The expensive crumbs

There are very few institutions that deliver quality education and provide opportunities for the overall growth of the students. These are private institutions and charge huge amount of fees. They take the best students, while majority of the remaining have no option but to join a less known institution. These institutions are here just to make fast cash. They too extract higher amount of fees and but provide substandard education in medicine, nursing, management and computers. They do not have permanent staff, library and computer facilities but promptly provide photocopied notes just before the exams. Often their notes are directly copied from test books and are out of date. Thus majority of the students end up paying for the crumbs.

Commission agents and head hunters

Poaching animals is a criminal offence but if people are poached then it is not criminal in any sense. There is innovative method used by these short time institutions to collect students. They either send their agents from here or appoint someone from the local area in different states of the country. These agents target students in their place by giving them information on their sponsoring institutions, alluring those students to come and take admissions. These agents are handsomely paid with free trips and incentives. For e.g.: If an agent gets a students he certainly gets Rs.10000- 25000.But the irony is when the students land up here they are perplexed to witness that all information they got was wrong. But it is too late for them since they have paid the fees already.

If this is about the students, let us see about the teachers. The local agents target mainly fresh post graduates for lecturers post and experienced professors for administration etc. by offering them with better salary, incentives and even provide vehicles just to come and join their institutions. This is called head hunting.

Match box Structures

The infrastructure of some of the institutions in the city is really an issue of worry. We have colleges run on the first floor of a commercial complex. The lower floors are used as shops and stores. These buildings do not have fire exists, emergency stairs etc. In the case of fire, God save them. Other facilities like cafeteria, wash rooms, playing ground or corridors do not exist. Aren’t these essential for an educational institution? We have several examples in our country, where students have lost their lives because of lack of safety exists. Such catastrophes have not yet opened the eyes of neither the authorities nor the institutions. Another concerning fact is that since there are no play grounds for several institutions students cannot develop their sports talents. We see many of the institutions conducting their annual sports meet in Mangala Stadium. These sports meets are wound up by afternoon. This has to happen because one cannot expect students to participate in sports without giving them a place to practice.

Students on wheels

Many of the institutions provide their students with bus facilities to reach them. The city witnesses increasing number of yellow colored vehicles as the days pass. This facility has both good and bad effects. The good part of this is that students do not have to travel in overcrowded city buses but the negative effect is, lot of time is wasted in the journey. Those students who stay outside the city limits will be picked up first and will be taken for a ride throughout the city. In the evening it is the same case and they will reach last. This problem has no solution but institutions can adopt other ways to stop this colossal waste of time just to travel.

There are several institutions engaged in contract carriage deals for cost cutting. The vehicles used in this case are retired buses from service. They are old and dirty. For the drivers of these vehicles students are like goods, which they have to pick and drop while giving least importance for their safety.

Safe Investment

Investment in education has become the safest for some of the trusts. They do not hesitate to collect lakhs of rupees in the name of education. The students who have paid the fees have to slog throughout the year just to make sure that their investment is right. The collected money is invested in raising commercial complexes and better investment plans. There are other institutions that promise free foreign tours, free laptops for their students. But there are no institutions in India that offer anything absolutely free just because you are their students. Every penny is extracted in the name of fees, donations etc. while majority of the students end up thinking they are getting all these benefits for free.

Mushrooming Coaching Centers

‘Aarakshan’ the recently released movie brings up this epidemic of coaching centres. The substandard education provided by some of the institutions in the city has promoted the growth of coaching centres. We can see hundreds of hoardings and banners right outside engineering, management and medical colleges about coaching classes. This is a kind of insult to institutions, but who bothers.

In the end the one must seriously worry about, how sanctity of education is defamed by some the intuitions by turning education into business? And why haven't the authorities concerned not done anything to stop this loot in the name of knowledge? The recent remark by Narayan Murthy stands true in this case too.