Prof Javed Mughal
The Paid-Assignment-cult prevailing in the Colleges have practically told upon the health and sanctity of the institutions and deteriorated the very academic environment thereof. It has been observed that over the years the Distance Learning Centers housed in the Colleges paying a nominal amount of honorarium to the hired teachers and Teacher-Functionaries have been instrumental in degrading the academic atmosphere of the Host institutions. It has also been noticed that by and by the staff engaged in these centers are more considerate and leaning towards these Paid Assignments than to the institution where-on the very survival of their family, the translation of their projects and prospects and the security of their future depend. Some of the College teachers love to sit in the office to work for the said centers doing paid assignments for a very meager amount of remuneration at the cost of their primary duty which fetches hefty amount of salary and all the basic amenities of life to them. The teaching community especially at the College Level stands divided into four broad categories-one that is successful in commercializing education out in the main-market, second that being incapable of doing so grab the paid assignments within the institutions following the policy of ‘Bhagte Chor ki Langoti hi sahi’, the third one that falls neither in the first nor the second class of teachers and is hence trundling in between and the fourth one that keeps on fighting tooth and nails against such a miasmic approach. The teacher who once upon a time was a perennial source of inspiration for the generations and who used to be iconized and idolized as divine guru and mentor is now-a-days looked down upon by the society as tuition hawker depending upon the good will of the students for money.
This is the only reason that the educational standard in our state has deplorably come down. If we look back to the old days, we get surprised to find not even a distant commonality between the old and the current educational levels for the simple reason that we believe in selling and purchasing education and the student for us is no more than a customer who is important only till he disgorges money into our insatiable pockets. There was a time when the teachers loved to attain to a level of moral, ethical and humanitarian character where money did not matter even a bit but at the present times our teachers have attained to level of lust for money where moral and ethical character has lost its significance. The current heart-rending spectacle of the teaching community can definitely be ascribed to the reluctant and derogatory approach of the system towards this prophetic and pious profession but at the same time it shall not be out of place to say that the teaching community also failed a great deal to conserve its image in the society. It has succumbed to the enthralling and infatuating impact of the modern material glamour. We got stripped of the garb of morality and entrenched into the captivating fold of mundane pleasures where humanity and values stand nowhere. It leaves me sans all senses to understand sometimes when I think that a professor, despite wasting huge sum of salary from the govt. exchequer, is so worried about a meager amount of remuneration from these Distance Education Centers that he almost dies after it.
He can go to any extent to procure an assignment in these centers, even if he has to exercise the influence of MLA, Minister and even Chief Minister. This is really disgusting. The Distance Learning Centers are happy about it because the big talent, at the rock-bottom-price, is available to them. A professor who is nowhere visible during the active hours of his duty on the campus, all of a sudde appears after 3 pm to deliver additional duty. Teacher stands so mesmerized by the additional study centers and the tuition centers that even though they are seen while teaching in the Colleges class-rooms, they are mentally somewhere else occupied with a continuous struggle across their minds to find private job and paid assignments. They can’t focus their concentration on their primary duty. They extend just a step-motherly treatment to their students which they have been appointed by the Government for. This is the major tragedy with the modern teacher especially at +2 and College levels.
What I could infer from this dismal picture till now is that the Life, in fact, dictated by a balanced combination of Euphoric and dysphoric possibilities can be a source of equanimity both for an individual and the society as well. “Excess of everything is bad” is quite fit and meaningful even today when countless maxims and dictums have lost their relevance and meaning due to cataclysmic changes in human nature. It is quite natural that the moment your security of life is fully guaranteed, you are most likely to go astray, reluctant and thick-skinned to so many sensitive issues. Exceptions are always there and everywhere but my stand point of view is based on the majority. When you are fully secure in respect to your survival or when your job is permanent particularly in this country, you become the most comfortable doing nothing, puffing out cigars, sitting in a comfy chair for the day long, gossiping, eating and drinking not moving even an inch, sluggish, phlegmatic despite the fact that this very despicable and suicidal style of your life is getting stronger and stronger to consume your own energy. Off course it is not your fault because this attitude is very much inbred into the very mankind.
All the discoveries and inventions were carried out by the scientists only because they wanted to be comfortable. But complete security of survival to an individual is detrimental to the collective security of society. Pulls and pressures must always be there and man must practically, not theoretically (as it is happening in our country) be accountable at every tick of clock for his deeds to the system in letter and spirit and punishment must be there every now and then. There is no any other way-out to streamline this small statured human being having capacity of tons of uranium to destroy this globe. One must not forget that this human being is so complex and invincible that God had to deploy number of prophets and apocalypses to shape him properly but even then this small-sized man could not be set in order. Under such circumstances, the laws of Medes and Persians are the need of the hour at least to extract its faculties for the common welfare.
Relaxation, unnecessary freedom and the total assurance of any kind can not be so fruitful as the restriction, discipline, stringent surveillance and tough control when we come to the point of generating result oriented performance. Today the fabric of standard educational system, responsible for the evolution of a healthy global society in general and the railing up of the country in particular, is suffering at the altar of despicable greed and lust for money. The teacher has developed a habit of earning money even at the cost of his dignity and the respectable survival of the institution. He is violating the trust of the profession wherefrom he gets everything-the happiness for his children, respectable niche in the society and multidimensional security for his family. But in the current society he has degraded the image of his profession to the extent that one would like to become a Police Constable but not a College Teacher. The writing skills, reading habits, conversational elegance, microscopic reflexes and royal behavior that were the symbols of this profession once in the past, are now the forgotten stories for a modern teacher. In Colleges now-a-days the pestilence of these paid assignments is in fact biting into the very infrastructure of the academics. Some of the poor teachers have dedicated their whole life and principles entirely to these paid assignments for a very scanty and infra-dignitary amount of remuneration at the cost of their professional dignity. The instant need of the hour is to wind up all these Distance Learning Centers functioning on the College Campuses and emancipate the College academics from the shackles of such bugs sucking the blood of the educational system. The Department of higher education is expected to pay attention to this side and do all the needful to cure these institutions of higher learning of this curse and restore the congenial atmosphere for the students to heave a sigh of relief.
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