I rant therefore I'm an anchor : Journalism is a noble calling, don't tarnish it
This is a
rejoinder to “I ask therefore I am Hindu” by Sagarika Ghose.
In any comment on an article which deals with both faith
and politics (of education), the chances of the discourse being adorned with adjectives like
malicious, hateful, divisive, etc., are very high. Hence it is better to start
with a story to lighten up, to dilute the bitterness which is likely to develop
during the discussion.
The question was simple. If ‘A’ is equal to 2
and ‘B’ is also equal to 2, what would ‘A+B’ be equal to? Four people, a teacher, an accountant, an
economist and one MSM anchor were invited to answer it.
The teacher came and responded ‘4’, promptly
& unequivocally.
The accountant came, fiddled with his
instruments, created a spreadsheet, referred to some books and finally decided
that ‘4 ± 10%
would be a safe answer, for the time being.
The economist (No, not MMS) came, shut the door
and closed the blinds, switched off the reading lamp and whispered in the
questioner’s ear, “What do you want it to be?”
But the MSM anchor came saw the question and
began the outrage.
“What do you mean A+B? Do you claim to
represent both of them? Is your blatant attempt to join them not a clear
violation of their individual freedom? By doing so are you not betraying your
totalitarian agenda? How can you quantify both ‘A’ and ‘B’ as 2? The problem
with your grouping is that you reduce living human beings into numbers! Do you
realize that by looking at the problem numerically you are being insensitive to
the living beings and their life is being torn apart by your insensitive &
cruel treatment?“
“How can you ignore the social & political
implications of this union? Are you trying to say that you can ignore the
social paradigm completely? Can you afford to hold in contempt, the aspirations
of the smaller numbers?”
“By the way, why only ‘A + B’? Why not ‘A x B’?
or AB? Why only A & B? Are you not insensitive to the
aspirations of other alphabets? And are you aware that due to your infatuation
with ‘A’ & ‘B’, other special characters get left out? When will they get
the chance to join mainstream? Not to mention, your complete disregard to the
other, less preferred operators!”
“How can you claim to represent only ‘A’ and
not ‘B’? This is divisive agenda, this is polarizing approach. Is it not going
to create a situation similar to 19XX? Are you not pushing the country towards
a civil war? Are you not dividing the alphabets between opposite camps because
of your electoral gains? Are you not putting them on a warpath only to reap dividends
at the hustings?
Phew! But that is how it goes on and on…
Anyway, coming back to your piece, I would like
to point out one wrong extrapolation, one false representation and a small
matter of the wrong basic premise, if you don’t mind, that is!
Firstly, let us look at this paragraph.
Even as Batra
campaigns for rewriting textbooks, an ASER report shockingly revealed that 9%
children in class V cannot identify numbers, 44% cannot read paragraphs and 29%
are unable to divide and subtract. Despite spending years in school, millions
are growing up ‘functionally illiterate’. Even as the Chinese pour resources into
bringing their education to global standards, the Right wants to pull Indian
students back into an illusory ‘Vedic’ Age.
Though most of us would agree with your
contention that today’s literates only make up the literacy percentages for the
state and can barely be defined as functionally literate, your extrapolation of
its relationship to attempt to rewrite textbooks is not far-fetched. It is
rather unconnected. Are the children not able to read paragraphs or do division
or subtraction, because they had textbooks which conformed to Batra’s idea of
education? Or is it because the way our teachers impart knowledge to them,
making them remember things without understanding, learning by rote, that is
responsible for this gap?
It is like saying “If Sagarika was 24 in 1994,
she must be insane now.” Whether you are or are not, if it has to be proved by
this statement then the arguments have to connect with each other, the second
one has to flow from the first, which it does not. And it applies to both the cases.
Secondly, you did subtly hint that Batra used a
totalitarian method against Doniger’s book. My view is that he used his
questioning spirit to ask the courts a question, “Is this book worthy of being
called a piece of literature or is it, as it looks to me, an attempt to defame &
tarnish the worthies we worship?” Even before the court could answer, the publisher
realized that the question had more value than the book and withdrew the book.
By the way, Doniger’s book had as much literary
value as our news channels are bearer of news or harbinger of change. Please do
well to remember the reporter on Kejriwal’s beat posting updates on color of
his stool. Hope you did not read it just after a heavy lunch.
Thirdly, the debate is indeed on. The vaad,
vivaad & samvaad is continuing. Batra is a part of it, you are part of it,
I am a part of it. All of us are part of it, in our own small (or big, if it
hurts someone’s ego) ways, we keep debating and the fact that no one gets
endangered due to this debate or samvaad is what keeps Hinduism alive.
Every samvaad can have a crusader, a defender,
a conservative, a reformer, a doubter, an atheist, a believer. It takes all
kinds to make a rainbow. All of us, including Batra, you, me or everyone else
are exponents of this debate. All of us would keep asking questions in our
ignorant ways and probably keep answering them too, in our own idiotic ways.
The spirit won’t be stifled.
Important thing to remember is, in this debate,
no one is shot at, no one is beheaded or no one is asked to convert.
By the way, communists were not the only one to
ban English in Primary Schools. The other distinguished grouping which did so
was Samajwadi Party. Unfortunately, they do not have the limitation of a persuasion,
they are neither left nor right. Their interests being bit strictly personal in
nature, are not amenable to being classified as an agenda and castigated!
