wednesday, june12, 2019 squandering the gender dividend€¦ · 10 wednesday, june12, 2019 cm yk...
TRANSCRIPT
DELHI THE HINDU
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CMYK
A ND-NDE
EDITORIAL
Sudhanva Deshpande
It is both apt and reductive thattwo images dominate others asGirish Karnad is remembered
on social media: one, with GauriLankesh, protesting the killing ofKarnad’s fellow Dharwadian, Prof.M.M. Kalburgi; the other, wearingthe #MeTooUrbanNaxal placard,at the memorial to mark the fi��rstanniversary of Lankesh’s own killing. Over the past few years, Karnad was seen as one of the mostconsistent, fearless and principleddefenders of freedom of speech,cultural diversity and democracy.In the face of death threats, he remained unfazed, and even in hisfrail health, he made it a point toattend protest gatherings.
Even though Karnad, unlike hisolder contemporary and fellowJnanpith awardee U.R. Ananthamurthy, did not belong to a particular political tendency (Ananthamurthy was an avowed socialist,inspired by Lohia), his commitment to democratic values meantthat he often took vocal stands onissues. While many tributes to Karnad have noted that he was Director of the Film and Television Institute of India in 197475, not
everyone noted that he resignedafter the Emergency was imposed.And his taking vocal stands againstthe Hindu Right didn’t start in thelast few years; he spoke up at leastfrom the early 1990s onwards.
Remarkable pre-eminence Karnad was perhaps India’s mostpreeminent playwright. He wascertainly something of a prodigy.It is a truism that Mohan Rakesh,Badal Sircar, Vijay Tendulkar andKarnad form the quartet thatshaped India’s postIndependencetheatrical canon. Karnad was theyoungest by a decade. Rakesh’sfi��rst great play, Ashadh Ka Ek Din,appeared in 1958, Sircar’s EbongIndrajit in 1962, and Tendulkar’sShantata! Court Chalu Aahe in1967. Karnad’s Yayati dates to 1961,when he was a mere lad of 22. Generally, playwrights take a little longer to mature as compared to other writers. Good dramatic writingis almost impossible to achievewithout the experience of workingin, or writing for, a real, activetheatre. Having a director takeyour text apart and reassemble it,hearing actors speak your lines,observing scenographers imaginethe setting, having a live audiencerespond to your text, all teach youas much, if not more, about playwriting as watching or reading plays.
That he wrote Yayati withoutvirtually any previous theatre experience is remarkable enough,but that he wrote it in Kannada
makes it doubly remarkable. AsKarnad recalled, when he set sailon a Rhodes Scholarship to England, he had fancied himself apoet who had ‘trained myself towrite in English, in preparation forthe conquest of the West’. Karnadknew at least fi��ve languages — Konkani, Kannada, Marathi, Hindi andEnglish — but in a sense it did takesome ‘unlearning’ for him to rediscover the language of his childhood. But clearly the ambition toconquer the West never quite lefthim — he not only translated hisown plays into English, he alsowrote original plays in English andtranslated them into Kannada.
And yet, for most of his playwriting career, Kannada puristsscoff��ed at Karnad’s writing, considering it, and the author, too Anglicised. It was only when he wroteTalé-Danda, about the medievalpoet revolutionary Basavanna, in anorth Karnataka dialect, that fi��nally the murmurs went down.
Karnad’s playwriting oeuvre is
so substantial and varied, both inform and content, that it is impossible to reduce it to neat generalisations. For instance, he is generally thought of as someone whoworked with material drawn frommythology and folklore, as well ashistory, initially, and only turnedto an entirely diff��erent style withcontemporary urban settings inhis late work. However, he wroteAnju Mallige, set in England andabout an incestuous relationshipbetween a brother and sister, in anentirely naturalistic style, early inhis career.
Many of Karnad’s plays are acknowledged as masterpieces. Yayatiis the story of a king who pleadswith his son to take on a curse given to him, the curse of old age.The son, then, for no fault of his,becomes an old man, older thanhis own father. Tughlaq is a studyof a king so far ahead of his timethat he is considered mad, andwho ends his reign in bloodshedand chaos. In a sense, the play refl��ected the confusion that Karnad’s generation felt a decade orso after Independence, and insome ways it also presaged theEmergency. Hayavadana is thetale of a woman with a jealous husband who beheads himself, hisfriend who also beheads himselffearing that he will be suspected ofmurder, and the woman preparingto behead herself when the goddess takes pity on her and grantsher a boon. She can get both men
back to life if she only attaches theheads to the bodies. In her confusion, she mixes up the heads, attaching them to the wrong bodies.Which of the two is her husband,now? The man with the head, orthe man with the body? Nagaman-dala is a story of a woman with anuncaring husband, who is visitedby a cobra at night, who takes herhusband’s form. The woman issurprised to fi��nd her husband loving, tender and erotic at night, butbrutish and apathetic in the day.She has to prove her fi��delity to thehusband, and the cobra againcomes to her rescue.
Student of power play Two overarching themes stand outin Girish Karnad’s playwriting career. One is power — how it openspossibilities but also corrupts,how men fail to use it for the greater good, how it leads to brutality.The other is female desire, women’s aspirations, and the inability of men to come to terms with it.Both are political themes, and today more charged than ever.
Girish Karnad stood up andspoke out against the Hindu Right.It would only be fi��tting if his playsare now reinterpreted with contemporary sensibilities by youngertheatre makers to fi��ght the goodfi��ght.
Sudhanva Deshpande is an actor and
director with Jana Natya Manch, Delhi,
and an editor with LeftWord Books
The playwright against the RightGirish Karnad’s commitment to democratic values meant that he often took a vocal stand on issues
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more letters online:
www.hindu.com/opinion/letters/
If labour force survey data are tobe believed, rural India is in themidst of a gender revolution in
which nearly half the women whowere in the workforce in 20045had dropped out in 201718. The61st round of the National SampleSurvey Offi��ce (NSSO) recorded48.5% rural women above the ageof 15 as being employed either astheir major activity or as their subsidiary activity — but this numberdropped to 23.7% in the recentlyreleased report of the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS). Is thispart of a massive transformationof rural lifestyles or are our surveys presenting a skewed picture?If this change is real, does it off��er acause for worry?
Incremental declineBefore we turn to examining thesechanges, it is important to notethat the drop in work participationby rural women is not sudden. Thelatest data from the PLFS simplycontinue a trend that was well inplace by 201112. Worker to population ratio (WPR) for rural womenaged 15 and above had droppedfrom 48.5% in 20045 to 35.2% in201112, and then to 23.7% in 201718. In contrast, the WPR for urbanwomen aged 15 and above declined only mildly, changing from22.7% in 20045 to 19.5% in 201112,and to 18.2% in 201718.
One can view this drop in therural female WPR both positivelyand negatively. If rising incomeslead households to decide that women’s time is better spent caringfor home and children, that is
their choice. However, if womenare unable to fi��nd work in a crowded labour market, refl��ecting disguised unemployment, that is anational tragedy.
If the WPR is declining due torising incomes, we would expect itto be located in richer households— households with higher monthlyper capita expenditure and amongwomen with higher education. Acomparison of rural female WPRsbetween 20045 and 201718 doesnot suggest that the decline is located primarily among the privileged sections of the rural population. Between 20045 and 201718,women’s WPR declined from30.6% to 16.5% for the poorest expenditure decile, and from 31.8%to 19.7% for the richest expenditure decile. More importantly,most of the decline in the WPR hastaken place among women withlow levels of education. For illiterate women, the WPR fell from 55%to 29.1% while that for women withsecondary education fell from30.5% to 15.6%.
This broadbased decline withsomewhat higher concentrationamong the least educated and thepoorest is consistent with the industries and occupations in whichit has occurred. Decomposing the24.8 percentage point decline inwomen’s WPR between 20045and 201112, the decline in work onfamily farms and allied activitiescontributed the most (14.8 percentage points), followed by casualwage labour (8.9 percentagepoints) and in work on family enterprises in other industries (2.4percentage points). These werecounterbalanced by a 0.7 percentage point increase in regular salaried work and a 0.5 percentagepoint increase in engagement inpublic works programmes such asMahatma Gandhi National RuralEmployment Guarantee Act
(MGNREGA). Most of the decline —23.1 percentage points out of 24.8— came from reduced participation in agriculture and allied activities.
Men’s participation in agriculture has also declined. Amongmen aged 15 and above, 56.1% participated in agriculture in 20045,while only 39.6% did so in 201718.However, men were able to pickup work in other industries whereas women reduced their participation in other industries as wellas agriculture — resulting in a lower WPR. Therein lies the conundrum for rural women. Mechanisation and land fragmentationhave reduced agricultural workopportunities for both men andwomen. Other work opportunities, except for work in publicworks programmes, are not easilyopen to women. This challenge isparticularly severe for rural women with moderate levels of education. A man with class 10 education can be a postal carrier, a truckdriver or a mechanic; these opportunities are not open to women.Hence, it is not surprising thateducation is associated with a lower WPR for women; in 201617,29.1% illiterate women were employed, compared to only 16% women with at least secondary education.
Another clue to the decline inwomen’s work opportunities rather than women’s desire to work isrefl��ected in the fact that womenwho are counted as being out of labour force are not simply contentto be homemakers but often engage in whatever economic activities they fi��nd. Women’s work andfamily responsibilities rarely fi��t inneat compartments but household responsibilities do not prevent women from working. Manyrural women raise chickens as wellas children; husk paddy for salewhile daal simmers; and sell vegetables in a market while caring forbabies.
The NSSO and PLFS survey design relies on two questions. First,interviewers assess the primaryactivity in which respondentsspent a majority of their prioryear. Then they note down thesubsidiary activity in which individuals spent at least 30 days. If individuals are defi��ned as working byeither primary or subsidiary criteria, they are counted amongworkers.
This is a categorisation thatserves well in cases where agriculture is the primary activity and various agriculturerelated tasks canbe grouped together to comprisethe 30day threshold. But as demand for agricultural work declines and women engage in diverse activities, their work tendsto become fragmented. A womanwho spends 15 days on her ownfi��eld during the sowing period, 10days as a construction labourerand 15 days in MGNREGA workshould be counted as a worker using the subsidiary status criteria,but since none of the activities exceed the 30 days threshold, it isquite possible that interviewers donot mark her as being employed.Ongoing experimental research atthe National Council of Applied
Economic Research’s National Data Innovation Centre (NCAERNDIC) suggests a tremendous undercount of women’s work usingstandard labour force questions,particularly in rural areas.
This is not to suggest that fi��xingthe problem of undercount in surveys is the solution to decliningWPRs. The undercount is a symptom of the unfulfi��lled demand forwork. Although women try to fi��ndwhatever work they can, they areunable to gain employment at anintensive level that rises above ourlabour force survey thresholds.This suggests an enormous untapped pool of female workersthat should not be ignored.
Possible solutions Establishment of the Cabinet Committee on Employment and SkillDevelopment is a welcome moveby the new government. It is to behoped that this committee willtake the issue of declining femaleemployment as seriously as it doesthe issue of rising unemploymentamong the youth. Not all policiesneed to be gender focussed. Oneof the most powerful ways inwhich public policies aff��ect ruralwomen’s participation in nonagricultural work is via developmentof transportation infrastructurethat allows rural women to seekwork as sales clerks, nurses andfactory workers in nearby towns.If the cabinet committee were tofocus on multisectoral reformsthat have a positive impact on women’s work opportunities, the potential gender dividend could befar greater than the much celebrated demographic dividend.
Sonalde Desai is Professor of Sociology,
University of Maryland, U.S., and
Professor and Centre Director, NCAER-
National Data Innovation Centre. The
views expressed are personal
Squandering the gender dividendIt is a national tragedy that women unable to fi��nd work are dropping out of the labour force
Sonalde Desai
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Girish KarnadJnanpith and Padmaawardee Girish Karnad,who was also one of India’sfi��nest playwrights, was amultifaceted personality(Inside pages – “GirishKarnad – actor with aconscience”, “Unapologeticcritic of the rightwing” andEditorial page – “The scriptwriter of culture”, all June11). He had a modern mindyet was rooted. Karnad wasan intellectual giant whoalways had the courage tospeak his mind and wearhis heart on his sleeve. Hewas unconventionallyconventional, classy andoriginal. India will miss himdeeply as he was a rarity.C.G. Kuriakose,
Kothamangalam, Kerala
■ India has lost a strong voicein support of social causesand the freedom ofexpression. He was known tomany, being a versatilewriter, actor and an
intellectual, and on accountof the serial ‘Malgudi Days’and the science magazineprogramme on Doordarshan,‘Turning Point’. He stood forhis convictions, inspired byour rich cultural values andheritage. As an artist with aconscience, he synthesisedIndia and Bharat as a whole.The best way to keep hismemory alive is to keep ourinstitutions alive. R.D. Singh,
Ambala Cantt, Haryana
■ Karnad’s passing hasbrought down the curtain ona glittering career and a lifethat was dedicated to art andliterature. In a way, he was arebel both in cinema and life.His was a prominent socialvoice, and there was rarely asocial cause or a burningissue of the day that he hadnot commented on. It is agreat loss for India. J.S. Acharya,
Hyderabad
■ The country has lost anextraordinary playwrightwho never shied away fromembracing progressive ideasbesides speaking out boldlyagainst the pernicious trendof stifl��ing dissent and theclimate of intolerance. Healways took care to ensurethat Indian theatreorganically linked itself to itsperformative traditions. Thevoid he has left will bediffi��cult to fi��ll.M. Jeyaram,
Sholavandan, Tamil Nadu
■ Many of us feel his passingas a personal loss. Hebelongs to every one of us ashe was connected to thepanIndian audience throughliterature. An era of ethicaland intellectual inspirationhas ended, which is painful. Ananthi Santhaiyan,
Pune
Kathua verdictThe verdict in the Kathuacase, of life imprisonment, is
grossly inadequateconsidering the gravity of theoff��ence (Page 1, “Three getlife sentence for rape,murder of 8yearold inKathua”, June 11). A child wasabducted, raped and killed.There was also attempt todestroy the evidence. Allthese ingredients speaksabout the mens rea of theperpetrators. The Stategovernment should appealagainst the verdict. Thepunishment seems toolenient. T. Anand Raj,
Chennai
■ Justice has fi��nally beenserved. Yet it is a travesty ofjustice that those who shouldhave been preventing it werethemselves involved in thecrime. Another point is thatthe images of ralliesorganised to shield theperpetrators will scar ourconscience for a long time.Clearly, we are not an idealcivil society as yet. The case
play have produced a bodyof work that still has amazingrecall value. R. Sivakumar,
Chennai
Kohli’s gestureVirat Kohli’s special gesture(‘Sport’ page, “‘Don’t boo,cheer Smith’,” June 10) — tobe there for the underdog,more so one with a player hehas clashed with and whosestar is on the ascendant — is aspecial gesture, whichperhaps represents the kindof Indian our foundingfathers had in mind. Kohlihas shown that his heartbeats for the other India —the one where, in lore, gods,kings and the commonerarrayed themselves on theside of what is right. He hasshown the sporting world aninspiring, transformativevision. B.G. Krishnan,
Chennai
held a mirror to us exposingthe ugly truth of society.Meghana A.,
Shell Cove, NSW, Australia
Great humoristThe passing, in Chennai, of‘Crazy’ Mohan, prominentTamil theatre artiste andscriptwriter for Tamil fi��lms,is shocking (Page 1, “‘Crazy’Mohan is no more”, June 11).An excellent stage actor,prolifi��c story writer, and ahumorist parexcellence, heensured without fail that hisaudience burst into peals ofinnocent laughter in everyscene. His mastery over theart of communication in anastonishingly humorous wayalso had messages forsociety. N. Visveswaran,
Chennai
■ His special bonding withactor Kamal Haasan resultedin absolute ribticklers. Mr.Haasan’s comic timing andMohan’s impeccable word
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Letters emailed to [email protected] must carry the full postal address and the full name or the name with initials.
The trial court verdict fi��nding three men guilty of
the horrifi��c gangrape and murder of an eight
yearold girl in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua dis
trict last year must be seen as the victory of justice over
communal propaganda. It is the answer that due pro
cess has given to sectarian interlopers who sought to
derail the investigation and trial by projecting the hei
nous crime against a girl belonging to the nomadic Ba
kerwal tribe as a plot to implicate Hindus. It is also a tri
umph for the justice system, as the Pathankot district
and sessions court has lived up to the faith reposed in it
by the Supreme Court last year, when the case was
transferred from J&K to Punjab for a fair trial. The apex
court had taken note of the hindrances to a fair trial in
the jurisdictional court, especially the hostile atmosph
ere against the prosecution. The formation of a group
called the Hindu Ekta Manch in support of those arrest
ed and the role played by members of the Bharatiya Ja
nata Party, including two Ministers in the then J&K go
vernment, had whipped up communal frenzy. It is
commendable that the Crime Branch of the J&K Police
and the prosecutors have brought home the guilt of
Sanji Ram, Parvesh Kumar and Deepak Khajuria, who
have been sentenced to life for murder and 25 years in
prison for gangrape. Further, the role of some police
personnel in trying to destroy evidence has also been
exposed. Sub Inspector Anand Dutta, Special Police Of
fi��cer Surender Verma and Head Constable Tilak Raj get
a fi��veyear term for washing some bloodstained
clothes, concealing the victim’s necklace and hair
band, and misleading the investigating police team
about the place of occurrence of the crime.
The investigation had been fairly quick, and the
chargesheet was prepared in two months. The trial
lasted a year, and the verdict has been delivered within
17 months of the occurrence. Appeals by the convicts
are only to be expected, and the Judge Tejwinder
Singh’s approach and the manner in which he appre
ciated the evidence would be determined by higher
courts. Even the prosecution may appeal against the ac
quittal of one of the accused, whose alibi that he was
appearing in an examination in Uttar Pradesh at the
time of the incident has been accepted. Some may
question the verdict for not imposing the death penalty
in what was presented as a crime aimed at dislodging
the Bakerwal community from the territory. However,
it is a needless cavil, as what matters is that criminal lia
bility has been established and a life term, which ought
to mean the remainder of the convicts’ natural life, has
been awarded. The larger takeaway is that effi��cient in
vestigation, diligent prosecution and judicial sensitivity
can ensure speedy justice in all cases, and more partic
ularly in cases of ghastly crimes that cause widespread
revulsion and outrage. It is indeed a judgment that will
inspire confi��dence in the justice system.
A welcome verdictThe Kathua case represents a triumph of
justice over communal propaganda
The Supreme Court order granting immediate bail
to journalist Prashant Kanojia, arrested by the Ut
tar Pradesh Police for sharing on Twitter a video
pertaining to Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, was not
unexpected. It was obvious that the arrest was arbi
trary, unwarranted and without any basis in law. The
State government’s attempt to justify its action smacked
of perversity and malice. The vacation Bench, compris
ing Justices Indira Banerjee and Ajay Rastogi, made the
right call in ignoring technical objections by counsel for
the State government that the apex court should not in
tervene as only a regular bail petition could secure re
lief to someone remanded by the jurisdictional magis
trate. The Bench did not consider the controversial
tweets as suffi��cient grounds for abridging personal li
berty. In observing that the order of release would not
amount to an endorsement of Mr. Kanojia’s tweets, the
court was only making a minor concession to the police
claim that he was making infl��ammatory comments on
social media. It is diffi��cult to believe that at a time when
social media networks are full of rampant abuse and
distasteful material, the police can be allowed to choose
one or two that appear to target political functionaries
and incarcerate those airing such views, disregarding
wellestablished norms for arrest and remand. In Mr.
Kanojia’s case, defamation, a noncognisable off��ence,
and Section 66 of the Information Technology Act were
cited initially. The latter relates to damaging computer
systems, and is inapplicable to a social media post. It
was quite clear that there was no case for remand.
There was a more fl��agrant illegality when Mr. Kanojia
was taken out of Delhi without a transit remand from a
local magistrate, mandatory when an accused is taken
from one State to another. Faced with criticism, the U.P.
Police added a section dealing with the off��ence of caus
ing public mischief and disturbing public tranquillity,
besides Section 67 of the IT Act, which relates to shar
ing of obscene or prurient material, with the motive of
obtaining a remand order. A few other journalists have
been arrested for discussing the content of the video
clip, in which a woman is seen expressing her wish to
marry the Chief Minister. What is disquieting, but un
surprising, is the perfunctory attitude of civil servants
towards the personal liberty of citizens. It is one thing
to pursue violations through legal action, but quite
another to lock up people for posts they deem off��ensive
to their political masters and conjure up justifi��cations
for their arrest. It is time magistrates who pass mechan
ical orders without application of mind and offi��cers
who carry out illegal instructions from the political lea
dership are made to face exemplary disciplinary action.
Thin-skinned mastersArbitrary arrest for a social media post
refl��ects a disregard for law and liberty
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THE HINDU DELHI
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 2019 11EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
CMYK
A ND-NDE
OPED
The Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, had consultationswith her Cabinet colleagues this evening [ June 11, New Delhi]on the Telengana issue. No defi��nite line of action seems tohave emerged from these consultations at which Ministers ofState from Andhra — Mr. K. Raghuramaiah, Mr. B. S. Murthyand Dr. K. L. Rao — participated by special invitation. The onlyindication available after the meeting of the Cabinet was thatthe Centre would not take any hasty decision. There is a feeling that no decision may be taken until after the return of thePrime Minister from her Japanese tour in the third week of thismonth. At today’s meeting, Mr. Y. B. Chavan, Home Minister,is reported to have given the impressions he had gained fromhis factfi��nding mission to Hyderabad last weekend. The consensus is understood to be in favour of fi��nding a solution within the framework of a united Andhra Pradesh with the concrete assurance that the people of Telengana would have voicein the administration and all other walks of life.
FIFTY YEARS AGO JUNE 12, 1969
Centre against hasty decision on Telengana
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FROM ARCHIVES
Since last year the question of making the Mysore EconomicConference permanent received great attention both from theoffi��cials and nonoffi��cials and opinions varied considerably onthe question. At the birthday session last year the matter wasdiscussed but His Highness the Maharaja announced that itwould be made permanent in one form or another, the detailsof the constitution being left to the conference itself. Sincethen at various committee meetings the matter was discussedbut arrived at no decision. The Government instead of committing to any scheme formulated certain proposals as basisfor reorganisation of the constitution of the conference. Theseproposals were discussed the whole of today [ June 11].
A HUNDRED YEARS AGO JUNE 12, 1919.
Mysore Economic Conference.
Vijaya Mulay, who died last month atthe age of 98, was an icon of educational technology. She was a pioneerof animated fi��lms for children. Hershort fi��lm, ‘Ek, Anek Aur Ekta’, continues to be an Internet hit many decades after it was made in NationalCouncil of Educational Research andTraining (NCERT)’s newly set up uniton educational technology, whichshe led for many years. She chairedthe National Focus Group whichdrafted the policy on technology included in the National CurriculumFramework (NCF), 2005.
Some members were unhappythat a fi��lmmaker was leading a groupthat covered the use of computers ineducation. Mulay’s own vision ofeducational technology off��ered noexception to the general rule thattechnology must promote pluralityof use and creative endeavour. Thatis not the direction that educationaltechnology took in India. She oftenwarned against schools and collegesbecoming graveyards of equipment.In an age when schools are perceivedas hostage markets, rememberingMulay means admitting how terriblyand expensively wrong our systemhas gone on the issue of technology —and not just technology.
Teachers at the margins That admission, however, is hardly atribute to her. Nor is it a tribute to theIndia that she, like many others ofher generation, symbolised. Indiawas an ongoing invention, and youwere part of it. The India she signifi��ed and carried with her everywheretold you to fi��nd new ways to relate toold problems. Togetherness meantthat you will not dominate, no matterhow much you know. Technologywas supposed to enable people tosolve their own problems and feelthat they could manage the machineon their own. For Mulay, the dangerof educational technology leading tocentralised decisionmaking was asgreat as the attraction that it wouldbring life into classrooms. How toavoid the risk of making the teacherfeel marginal and dependent was the
key challenge for policy. The fi��ght between the machine
and the teacher is an unequal one.Instead of being together, they havebeen placed in a state of confl��ict. Atthe moment, teachers are at the losing end. They are told to use a rangeof new gadgets and material to improve teaching. Smart classes areequipped with industrially manufactured lessons and tests. All that theteacher has to do is to facilitate thedelivery of these preplanned lessons. To add to this loss of intellectual autonomy and dignity, surveillance gadgetry is being applied tomonitor teachers, to assess whatthey are doing in the classroom.
From the other end too, namelythat of children and their parents,the teacher faces impossible challenges on a daily basis. At a recentconference I met several teachersdiscussing the diffi��culties they facewhen children bring informationthey have accessed through the Internet or through an app. A teacherfrom Haryana talked about a childbringing an image with a wellwrittendescription of a nuclear test Indiaconducted 3,000 years ago. Theteacher asked, how should I explainto this Class VI child that this information cannot be true? She wasaware, she said, that information ofthis kind has political value as it conveys, and also enhances, a certainkind of patriotism. She said manychildren in her class were convincedthat the information was correct.Moreover, they believed that many ofthe things she told them during herlessons were doubtful although theywere aware that for passing themonthly tests, they should writewhatever the teacher had told them.
At a young age, these children haddeveloped the capacity to maintaintwo separate repertoires of knowledge: one for personal convictionand the other for doing well atschool.
A double-edged swordIn this new technological environment, it is easy to forget everythingMulay said and ignore her warnings.The dominant tendency today is toperceive technology as a source of allsolutions, not as an aid. The biggesthurdle to reforms in education todayis the marginalisation of teachers.They have been at the receiving endof one move after another. They hadno choice but to follow whateverthey were told to do. Regimentedand compliant they always were; being repeatedly told to shift gears hasmade them cynical. This is a far cryfrom how Mulay defi��ned the purposeof using educational technology. TheNational Focus Group paper writtenunder her leadership explained howthe latest communication technology was a doubleedged sword. Whileit had the potential to enable common causes to create new communities, it also enabled globally dominant corporate power to discourageintellectual autonomy. To survivewith sanity in the new technologicalenvironment, our children “mustknow that nothing is valuefree (noteven Donald Duck).” Learning atschool must promote “a sense of discernment”, and this is no easy aim topursue in the prevailing technological environment.
Mulay lived for nearly a century,yet her passing away makes one feelas if we have lost a robust, youngvoice we urgently need. To keep her
memory alive, we must ask why oursystem of education has failed to benefi��t from new technologies of storage and communication of knowledge. Many people may not agreewith my assessment and insist thatour record of using technology — radio, television, computer, Internet —for improving education is not bad. Imight have agreed if I were not a frequent listener of Gyan Vani. The programmes it off��ers to students enrolled in distance education coursesare mostly just as wooden as the lectures they would have heard at a college or university. Mulay had warnedagainst precisely this tendency of using technology for replicating andmagnifying entrenched systemicweaknesses.
What knowledge means Mulay was neither revolutionary norradical. She worked inside systemsand softened people committed tohard lines and tough remedies. Oneof her extraordinary attempts at persuasion was to join French fi��lm director Louis Malle in writing to IndiraGandhi to convince her that she mustwatch his fi��lms. They were banned inIndia because they were critical andhurt national pride.
As a bridge between the world offi��lms and education, Mulay set a silent example of persistence in herbelief that schools could be softened.Had she been directly asked how, shewould have said, by working withteachers, giving them status and theexperience of taking decisions. Fewpeople today might agree with her.Contempt for school teachers andsuspicion in their competence arewidespread, and not merely in thebureaucracy. The socalled aspirational middle class has little patiencefor the teacher. Its demands fromchildren are as ruthless as the parents’ determination to hound theprincipal and her staff��. They perceive themselves as consumers, andthey will go to any length to get thebest value. They trust the drill master at the coaching institute becausehe delivers what he promises. Knowledge brought to life through technology is irrelevant in this scenario. So isits value as truth. What matters is itsinstrumental value, to let you get onto the next stage of the entrance process.
Krishna Kumar is a former director of the
NCERT
Remembering Vijaya Mulay means admitting how wrong India has gone on the issue of technology
Truth, technology and the teacher
Krishna Kumar
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The Modi government has acted swiftly topursue its foreign policy priorities. Focusedon strengthening India’s place in the world,it has begun by shoring up the country’s position in the immediate neighbourhood. Thismessage emanated from Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visits to the Maldives and SriLanka, and External Aff��airs Minister S. Jaishankar’s trip to Bhutan.
Ties with South Asian neighbours were apriority even earlier, as seen in the invitationextended to SAARC leaders to attend Mr. Modi’s swearingin ceremony in 2014. After thatthere were some diffi��culties. India’s relationswith Pakistan soured, while China continuedto expand its footprint in Nepal, the Maldives, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. However, India’s cooperation with Bangladesh, Bhutan,Afghanistan and Myanmar showed tangibleprogress. As a result, attention was consciously shifted from SAARC to BIMSTEC,thereby giving an eastward shift to India’sneighbourhood policy. In 2016, BIMSTECleaders were invited to the BRICS summit inGoa. BIMSTEC leaders also attended Mr. Modi’s swearingin last month.
Three visitsA week thereafter, Mr. Jaishankar was inBhutan holding comprehensive discussionswith his counterpart and the Prime Minister.He also met King Jigme Khesar NamgyelWangchuck. The visit was perhaps meant toassess the current thinking in Thimphuabout Chinese overtures to open diplomaticrelations and the border issue before Mr. Modi’s meeting with President Xi Jinping at theShanghai Cooperation Organisation summit.
Mr. Modi’s visit to the Maldives was astutely designed to showcase that a dramatic turnaround has taken place in IndiaMaldivesrelations. Former Maldivian President Abdulla Yameen gave a blatantly proChina tiltto his foreign policy. The result was that Mr.Modi had to wait until Mr. Yameen’s ousterbefore he could visit the Maldives in November 2018. Working in concert, the two governments have succeeded in deepeningmutual understanding. While visiting Indiain December 2018, President Ibrahim Solihwas still somewhat cautious as he spoke ofbalancing friends, old and new. But by thetime Mr. Modi landed in the Maldives last
week, Male had become more receptive. ThePresident and the Majlis speaker reiteratedthe Maldives’ commitment to its ‘India fi��rstpolicy’. The Majlis invited Mr. Modi to delivera special address. The President conferredthe nation’s highest honour on Mr. Modi.
This visit demonstrated how India has begun to implement recent decisions to extendample fi��nancial assistance, move ahead withprojects to be funded through a new $800million Line of Credit, and focus on peoplecentric welfare measures in accordance withthe priorities of the Maldives. This is in sharpcontrast with China’s approach of extendingmassive loans for mega infrastructure projects that end up in debt traps. Mr. Modi hitall the right buttons, highlighting India’s resolve to assist the Maldives in every possiblemanner. He identifi��ed countering terrorism,addressing climate change, and promotingan integrated and balanced IndoPacifi��c asthe key challenges for the region.
Mr. Modi’s visit to Colombo was prudent.It conveyed India’s solidarity with Sri Lankaas the latter struggles to overcome the overwhelming eff��ects of the Easter Sunday attacks. Mr. Modi held discussions with all themain actors: the President, the Prime Minister, the Leader of Opposition, and Tamilleaders. President Maithripala Sirisena refl��ected the nation’s view as he publiclythanked Mr. Modi for a productive visit.
Policy essenceNew Delhi has clearly indicated that theneighbourhood will continue to be a priority, but four subtle elements are being introduced in the policy matrix. First, without always insisting on reciprocity, India may getinto a proactive mode and adopt measures“to incentivise cooperation in the neighbourhood”, as Mr. Jaishankar put it. Second, India will prefer to work on quick impact projects that bring socioeconomic benefi��ts tothe people. Third, recognising its “limitedcapabilities”, as Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale disclosed, New Delhi would have no objection in forging a trilateral developmentpartnership, involving India and Japan in aneighbouring country. Fourth, SAARC’sdrawbacks have caused India’s consciousshift to BIMSTEC. Mr. Jaishankar explainedthat India sees a mix of “energy, mindset andpossibility” in the latter grouping. The government is moving in the right direction. Itcould also consider bringing the Maldives into BIMSTEC, at least as an observer. Finally,Mr. Jaishankar should visit other neighbourssoon, particularly Bangladesh and Myanmar.
Rajiv Bhatia is Distinguished Fellow, Gateway House,
and a former Ambassador
The importance of being neighbourly India is subtly adding four new elements in the policy matrix
Rajiv Bhatia
On World Day Against Child Labour( June 12) in 2017, India ratifi��ed twocore conventions of the International Labour Organization on child labour. It now has to double its eff��ortsto ensure that the benefi��t of thoseconventions reach the most vulnerable children.
Although comprehensive data onchild labour are not available for In
dia, as per the 2011 Census, in the age group 514 years, 10.1million of 259.6 million constituted working children. Eventhough there was a decline in the number of working children to 3.9% in 2011 from 5% in 2001, the decline rate isgrossly insuffi��cient to meet target 8.7 of the UN SustainableDevelopment Goals (SDGs), which is to end child labour inall forms by 2025. India therefore needs to embark on newand innovative approaches in its fi��ght against child labour.
The ratifi��cation of the core conventions on child labourgives rise to a range of priorities such as strengthening policy and legislative enforcement, and building the capacitiesof government, workers’ and employers’ organisations aswell as other partners at national, State and community levels. It is worthy of mention that India had taken importantsteps to eliminate child labour even before ratifying theseconventions. In addition, there are a few more importantsteps that the country can take in this direction.
India should invest in enhancing its body of knowledgeon child labour, emphasising quantitative information.While there are many common factors across the spectrum,each sector and each demographical segment will have itsown set of factors and drivers that push children into the labour market. These have to be addressed. Such factors anddrivers can only be identifi��ed and analysed through properresearch, surveys and assessments.
Eliminating child labour is fi��rmly placed within Goal 8 ofthe SDGs. A stronger nexus between the discourse on SDGsand the discourse on eliminating child labour can take theadvantage of complementarities and synergies of a widerange of actors engaged in both areas of work.
The growing interest of the private sector is a great opportunity that has to be further utilised, particularly to leveragekey infl��uencers in domestic and multinational supplychains. It is also a matter of competitive advantage for multinationals to ensure that child labour is eff��ectively eliminatedin their supply chains. A sectorwide culture of child labourfree businesses has to be nurtured.
As the world of work is transforming and new actors areemerging, one cannot underestimate the importance ofcreating a sound and vibrant platform to bring togetherthese actors. The fi��ght against child labour is not just the responsibility of one, it is the responsibility of all.
Dagmar Walter is Director, ILO Decent Work Technical Support Team for
South Asia and Country Offi��ce for India
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Saving childhoods Steps India could take to eliminate child labour
Dagmar Walter
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Budget-maximising modelEconomics
This refers to an economic model which tries to depict thetypical behaviour of bureaucrats who work for the government. A government bureaucrat, according to this model, willconstantly try to expand the amount of money and other resources that are under his control. The greater the amount ofresources under his control, the greater the chances of himwielding power over people who are dependent on these resources. The budgetmaximising model of bureaucratic behaviour was fi��rst proposed by American economist William Niskanen in the 1968 paper, “The peculiar economics ofbureaucracy”.
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CONCEPTUAL
Tamil Isai Sangam museum in Chennai
http://bit.ly/chennaimuseum
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