Sometime back- before the COVID-19 caught everybody's attention, I met an American journalist/activist at one of the premier education institute. Throughout the conversation (where I was on the sidelines- as I had gone to meet some faculty), the active participants - the faculty, research associates and PhD candidates were giving him inputs. Being a journalist, he was taking meticulous notes. He was visiting India and reporting a few things, supporting activists and causes. But what??? There were only 3 topics on which he was asking questions and seeking opinions. Ram Mandir verdict, Citizenship Amendment Act and Rafael deal. This may have been okay- had he been genuinely seeking opinions. He had visited Ayodhya the week before and was narrating his experiences. Within a few minutes, I understood that he was primarily seeking anti views only. He was out rightly rejecting/ignoring any views otherwise. Needless to say, the audience (maybe awed by white skin and accent- lot of us
School Few incidents over the last couple of weeks made me look up the meaning of school in the dictionary. As per Dictionary: skuːl/ noun: school; plural noun: schools 1. an institution for educating children. 2. any institution at which instruction is given in a particular discipline. An institution for Education Finished school about 25 years ago. I may be a little outdated, That’s what even I considered schools to be. Not because the dictionary says so. But we felt so, while we were in school. There was a lot that we learnt at school. From the books, our syllabus and curriculum. We had numerous activities like sports, debates, quiz competitions, cultural and co-curricular activities, apart from academics. Though we didn’t have a lot of facilities and infrastructure, but let's skip them for now. Talking about knowledge and education. I still remember a lot from my school days- the basic concepts and even its application. Many a times I am amazed, rather