At present there is no coordination between education and skill development. Skills should be developed through education, but this is not happening in India. Lakhs of youth are coming out of our academic factories with degrees like doctors, engineers, MBA etc., but most of them are not skilled and knowledgeable. Such people are not able to complete any work efficiently, but there is no dearth of employment for the skilled ones.
People with technical and practical knowledge may be behind in terms of degree and knowledge of English, but they can easily solve all kinds of problems including critical ones, because doing any work requires skill than degree. By developing skills, youth can do every work efficiently even without any degree.
The school and college teachers of our country believe that the child who is continuously coming first in every examination can only be considered intelligent, the students who are unable to meet this criterion are considered to be of low intelligence or stupid. There is no doubt that good marks obtained in schools and colleges indicate the commitment of students towards their studies, but it does not mean that we should consider it as proof of their being brilliant or not. On the basis of marks, no student can be considered brilliant or less intelligent.
It is not necessary for every student to have interest in every subject. The great scientist Thomas Alva Edison was interested only in physics. The story of the great scientist Albert Einstein is also similar. Lata Mangeshkar also had no interest in mathematics or science. Sachin Tendulkar or Mahendra Singh Dhoni may have had a very poor academic record, but they are great in their field. There are hundreds of examples of such geniuses in the society.
The second aspect is that a student may fall ill at the time of examination or may not be interested in studies in the initial days due to wrong company. It is often seen that such students, by working hard at the right time, beat the students who are always alert in the tests of life. Here formula does the work of ‘When you wake up, then it’s morning’. A student who has the desire to achieve success in life, despite passing third or second division in every class, is successful in securing a place in the top 20 or 50 in the IAS exam. The story of one such youth has been screened in the film “12th Fail”.
Even if job is not considered a measure of success, a student who is determined to do something like this succeeds in touching new heights in life. We also cannot deny the philosophy shown in the film ‘Three Idiots’. It is not necessary that every child becomes an engineer or doctor.
There are so many things to do in the world today that you cannot underestimate anyone. It just depends on your perspective as to who you consider talented.
If seen from the perspective of Indian Society, the scientists doing research on wild life are idiots of the highest order, while in reality they are very intelligent and committed to give something to the society, who are working with full dedication to complete their work. Apart from this, in India, only those children who are successful in getting the qualifying marks to apply for jobs by consistently scoring good marks till college are considered bright.
Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) had made public the marks of preliminary and main examination for the first time in the year 2013, in which 1004 candidates were declared successful and the top ranked candidate had secured 53 percent marks overall, while the last ranked had obtained 30 percent marks in the written examination. Earlier there was a belief that only the candidates who score more than 75 to 80 percent marks in the UPSC exam are declared successful. Leaving aside the matter of UPSC, still many government agencies like State Service Commission, Bank, Railway, Staff Selection Commission etc. do not make public the marks of successful candidates.
On one hand, students are scoring 100 percent marks in the 10th and 12th examinations, while on the other hand, in the UPSC examination, a general category candidate gets finally selected by scoring only 30 percent marks in the written examination. It is natural to raise the question whether these days the students who have scored 100 percent marks in class 10th and 12th are not appearing in competitive exams or are they appearing but their talent has blunted.
If the matter is limited to UPSC then it would be understandable. The situation is so bad that the candidates who had scored 100 percent marks in 10th or 12th exams are not able to score even 60 percent marks in the competitive examination conducted for recruitment of employees in banks or other private and public sector institutions.
Engineering, medical, ITI and other employment related education has definitely been started in the country, but the significance of these courses is nominal, because even after studying them, most of the youth are not skilled, whereas the skilled youth are responsible for the inclusive development of the country.
The skilled youth do not remain unemployed. He or she easily supports his or her family. Carpenters, blacksmiths, plumbers, electricians, masons, vehicle repair workers etc. never die of hunger. They also pay taxes to the government and keep the economic cycle of the country moving. Therefore, today instead of distributing degrees, the government should focus on making the youth skilled and should take further action towards providing employment as per their qualification & skill, because the level of knowledge of everyone is not the same, but everyone can do it with continuous hard work & perseverance.
There is also a need to verify the veracity of getting 100 percent marks in every subject even in litterateur in 10th & 12th exams. If this happens then the government and people will automatically give priority to skill development.
Satish Singh, Ahmedabad based Senior Columnist,Views are personal
