Check out what today's edition of Economic Times has to say under the title "
Very recently, IT-BHU was in the fray to be an IIT. If you are a supporter of that move, you would not want to check this. A few days back, I read about a new IITB that is coming up! Hold your breath, it is not an abroad campus of IIT Bombay (which could be reality in a few years time), but a new proposal for an IIT at Belgaum, Karnataka.
What could be the reason? Karnataka, as opposed to many other states in the country has no IITs. Hence, setup an IIT there! Then, there is a demand from Kerala also to setup an IIT there for a similar reason. A very deplorable situation - the fundamentals of the education system of a country are compromised for mere political mileage. I suspect, Arjun Singh can take the entire blame and Kapil Sibal can consider himself equally guilty.
So, what does the ET article say?
As many as 505 students, who got an opportunity to study in these premier technological institutes, did the unthinkable this year; they refused to study in an IIT.Does it take anything more than common sense to foresee this situation? I will not involve myself in the same old conversation again. The most frequently used rebuttal for the argument against, and quoted by ET in the article, is:
The reasons varied from ‘‘not having confidence in the new IITs’ ’ to ‘‘ getting allotments in not-so-popular streams’’, IIT officials said, adding that this experience might force HRD minister Kapil Sibal to do a rethink on his expansion plans for the IITs.
‘‘There were several parents who were not comfortable sending their kids to an IIT without a campus currently; few realised that all the old IITs, too, started from temporary campuses,’’ the head of one of the new IITs said.In 1950s when the IITs were setup in temporary campuses, there were hardly ANY engineering institutions in India and there definitely were not 400,000 people taking the JEE. Now, there are. In India, "engineering" has ceased to be a discipline, it has become an obsession with students and parents alike. The reason - IITs. In such a sensitive scenario, screwing around with the system will leave irrepairable scars in the fabric of education.
Two decades hence, when the "engineers" - thousands from the IITs and lakhs from other engineering institutions - take up the mantle of powering the economy, the repercussions might be severe. For, we will have a whole generation that had forayed into a career, just to live someone else's dreams and follow someone else's footsteps.
The parliament of India, meanwhile is busy creating an uproar over the body-frisking of a former President. The power of democracy. The voice of the people. Whatever.
10 comments:
its simple:
Newton's third law - when something tries to pull society upwards, society tries to pull i(i)t down.
Got the news 2de that a 100 people joined the IIT here at my place. but as u said it wasn't a very proud moment. First i thought it was the envy withn me tht these people dnt hv to toil as i had to get into an IIT but nw it feels good knowing there are similar thinkers.
"Few Realised that all the old IITs had started from temporary campuses" - is a very misplaced statement!
That is definitely not a good justification for this debacle! If you want to expand the brand, first ensure that your actions are worth the brand itself. Setting up new IITs without any sort of planning/infra to support it and then expecting Indian Students to be led towards them like sheep is assuming too much from these students(who after all have cleared JEE and therefore are reasonably intelligent :) )
A possible alternative would have been to set up IIT Kharagpur - Bhubaneswar campus(the home town) and then maybe in a few years upgrade it to IIT Bhubaneswar.
Dude,
At the rate we are going, we'll soon have an IITAN (Indian Institute of Technology, Anna Nagar) and IITT (Indian Institute of Technology, Thiruvattiyur). Everyone will be an IIT engineer - half of India's dream!
The other half, of course, will fulfill their dreams at places like AIIMS Savkaar Peth, AIIMS Saidapet and AAIMS Marina Beach.
Or, we should suggest we do it the BITS way, something along the lines of -
BITS Pilani Dubai Campus!
It's the side-effect of getting too much of limelight.Politicians don't understand any ground realities they just think IIT's can attract voters ,IIT's are good colleges so it should be their for 'my' people .Remember Pratibha Patil demanding women IIT in Amaravati (her area) .. or Mamta's statement that Railways may consider setting up IIT in future for children of their employee
The force of vote-banking politics is always pulling the Indian Society down. The politicians always think that they are doing good for the society but they indirectly harm it.
In UP, they are after computers which are lifelines of development.
In Karnataka, politicians want the medium of instruction in schools to be kannada. When the whole world is talking about Globalisation, they are trying to ban global language.
Now, even kids feel embarrassed of their parents if they dont know to speak in English.
Some days back, I heard my neighour's 7 year old son telling his mom,"Mom, you dont attend the PTA meeting. You dont know how to speak in English. Send Dad." :)
I thouroughly feel that the politicians should at least start picking up the signals now.
When there are too many IITs,they become kind of cliched.They tend to lose their charm.This way,the increase in the number of IITs is actually jeopardising the society.What needs to be kept in mind is the quality of education that is being delivered to students.This cannot be achieved by merely increasing the number of famed institutions.On the contrary,it dampens the competitive spirit among aspirants.
And yes!!!You were right!!I am an avid follower of your blog :) Your blogs are informative and interesting as well.Hence they make a wonderful read.Hope you continue to blog.
Well written rant. IITs have been made a pawn at the hands of politicians. Even the 'top 5' IITs are grappling with a shortage of faculty, substandard placements. On top of it, we have this 49.5% issue, which is eating IITs fom within. Today's report in TOI states that a whopping 1100 seats alloted for reserved category have been converted to preparatory course seats.
I can foresee 'The demise of IITs' becoming a case-study in business schools in the near future.
BTW, excellent blog theme. But why does no post or comment have a date-stamp or time-stamp next to it?
The blog sounds to me more like a scream than a genuine concern. The very assumption that starting new IITs will debase its quality is unjustifiable. This primarily stems from the chaivinistic attitude of IITians.
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