Clean and Green Villages

I was rewinding my memory as I read an article in Times of India today about the cleanliness in Indian rural areas. The green fields of my village ran through my mind. I could feel the cool breeze coming from the lake near by striking my face. The early morning walk was always a pleasant one. The traffic was so less, except for the occasional city bus, that children could play hide and seek in the streets. The only traffic sound was the cycle bells. It was a peaceful atmosphere. In today's article, the author has mentioned rightly the villages are no more rural in nature. They are catching up the urban culture in all respect. In terms of education, economy, and technology. The sad point is they also catch up urban areas in terms of dirt roads. Lush green is converted into less green. Everything urban is considered to be modern. People from Rural India are copying everything from Urban India. It is what they think is growth. I remember the late Cho Ramasamy once said the life in rural India is better because the people there fear God. They obey the village elders believing that's what is good for the village social life. I can't remember what he said exactly. This is what he meant. Why can't we use this behavior for improving the rural environment? Why can't we use village system of elders council for a positive change? In India, almost every village has so many temples. Almost every month there is one festival. Why can't we involve the temples in India to clean the village during each and every festival? Cleaning the village/town may become part of the ritual. We have not changed the rituals for a long time. There is no new addition to the rituals. It is time some innovation is introduced in our society. 1. Before and after the each festival, the particular community must take up the work of cleaning the village streets/ parks etc., This must be part of the religious festival. If this is done, places like Varanasi can be kept clean at least for the most part of the year. 2. Each temple, as an organizing institute, may call for people's participation in keeping the environment clean. This can be done keeping in mind that during the festival time many outsiders would come into the village. The health of villagers and that of the visitors will be taken care of with this measure. 3. If this is projected, as service to society is service to God, a sure way of taking them to heaven, we can expect many would fall in line. 4. Of course, there is one thing, though people can help in cleaning the village. The law of conservation of garbage (in India especially) is that the mass of garbage will never decrease, we can only transfer from one place to another place. The recent incident that took place in Delhi where one person died as the garbage slid onto the road, should remind us that we are only transferring the garbage, not treating them. Here comes the role of municipalities. The municipalities should be given the technological know how, money, place, a long term plan ( which can sustain at least for another 30 years) and man power to treat the garbage. The motto of our municipalities must be "Good Health" and nothing else. Of course what else we need?

Kahani - a bed time story for children

Long Long Ago…. There were three angels - Kalpana, Hashya and Nidhra - living in a village known as Nellai in India. They had a beautiful house with a huge garden where every child in the village liked to play. The children would tell a lot of stories to their parents whenever they returned home after playing in the garden. Each day all the three angels went to different directions and met the children. Kalpana would give the children Dreams. Hashya would make the children Laugh. And Nidhra would make them Sleep peacefully. This went on for decades. One day the three angels were sitting and talking over a cup of tea. They were sharing their experiences with the children. Hashya said, “I enjoy whenever I meet children and meeting each day a new child keeps me going on. Otherwise, I would get bored of being an angel”. “Yes. Being an angel we don’t have to work. As we don’t need anything. No hunger. No sickness. No worries. We are always happy”, said Kalpana. “But even though we are meeting every day one or other child, still I feel we are making only some children happy every day. Not all”, said Nidhra. “Of course. How can we be everywhere, all the time?”. That was Hashya. “I’m planning to go to God and ask him for a solution for this”, said Hashya. So they decided to go to God the next day. The next day they went to God and presented before him their problem and asked for his help to solve this problem. God gave them a gift covered with a beautiful red silk cloth. He also gave a magic word. He said upon saying the magic word their problem would be solved. The three angels left for their home with the silk covered gift. As soon as they reached their home, Kalpana eagerly opened the gift. It was a book. Nidhra took the book and saw it was all blank pages. Hashya took it and saw only blank pages. They were confused. They were thinking why God gave them a blank book. Then they decided to say the magic word. They kept the book on the table and sat around. They said the magic word. As soon as they said the word, they felt they were pulled towards the book. They became all letters and started falling on each and every page. The letters - “Ka”, “Ha” and “Ni”- the first letters of their name took the place on the first page. It was looking like this." "Kahani". The angels were not to be seen anywhere after that. But the book was printed many times. Each time when it was printed a new story appeared. Now all the children can “Dream”, “Laugh” and “Sleep” after reading these books. All the parents read the book to their children before bed.

The Nature...

Huuh…. The last week saw how the nature sends signals to show us who powerful is - the earth quake in china and then in Afghanistan and the volcanic eruption in Iceland. Today’s news says more than 1900 people died in China earth quake. The flights through Europe cancelled to the bellowing ash cloud caused due to the volcano.
I recall today what happened during the Gujarat earth quake. We were celebrating the Independence Day. Fortunately the discussion that we had the previous day made us to have the celebration in the open ground.

On the day of celebration, January 26, 2001, as we assembled in the volley ball ground, I noticed a lonely bird sitting on the top most branch of a tree and sounding a signal to all of us. I think it was a warning to all of us. I was not the only person to notice that bird. One our colleagues, noticed and he was sharing it the same moment when I was observing the bird. We both were looking at the beauty of the lonely bird singing a song. We both were poor at music that we could not understand the meaning and the forthcoming danger. The earth quake that followed made me think about the life that I am leading. What are we living for? Are we living to just enjoy what is on our way? Are we giving our near and dear ones the due they deserve? It went on and on….

Then came the flood after two years. I could sense I have to take some step forward to live my life with my dear ones. I decided to keep my friends from that moment. I decided to reconnect with one closest friend whom I unfortunately disconnected for her own good – for her good - at least that’s what I thought. I stayed with her for another five years. With time the memory weakens. We broke again in 2007.

Now the earth quake reminds me that resolution I have taken in the past. We forget many times that there is someone above us watching our actions every day every moment. The nature shows its might now and then so that we realize our insignificant size. Now once again it has shown us. Will we tread the right path? Will we obey the nature’s rules and accept the truth that we are part of the nature? Huuh….

So our school annual day program is going to be on 11 th and 12 th of December '09. Normally cultural programs are not my cup of tea. Except for some occational aberrations, I always try to keep myself away from embarassment. I feel I will be embarassed. Of course it happened couple of times when i tried to get involved. I remember my early days experiences with school cultural programs.

When i was in primary school ( I to V grade) I was selected to act in a drama. My only qualification was I could memorise most of the lessons that we were taught in school. I was to act as a king. The story is about two kings who are going too much rhetoric about going for a war. I had memorised all the dialoques and there was no problem till the last day. But as the fate willed I forgot all the dialogues when i was on stage. You think about my situation. I was well dressed like a king. A golden crown was decorating my head which did not incorporate the dialogues. A beautiful dhoti which i wore for the first time. My parents and relatives were present to see my acting skill. Every one was expecting that i would do a very great job. I was just muttering what my teacher was saying from behind the stage.

The other incident took place when i was in Eigth standard. Somehow i got the courage to give my name to participate in a singing competition. I was too young to understand about the skills that i had. In my school you can sing any song in a competition . It need not be classical song. It can be a cinema song. A movie song was my selection and i selected this particular song because it was from a movie with 'Sivaji' Ganesan as hero. I liked the movies of 'Sivaji' Ganesan. To my surprise no one came out with movie songs. I enjoyed listening to others singing. When my turn came i went to the stage. I just started to sing and before i could complete the first stanza, my teacher who was one of the judges, told me to stop and leave the stage. Oh my God!!! It was too embarassing. Till now I have never tried to sing again. Now I know how sweet my voice is. And I guard my melodious voice like a precious possesion. Never to allow anyone to hear it again.

Elections and results

I subscribe some of the socio political magazines, both English and Tamil. Some are Thuglak, Frontline. I had to read the political postmortem (or autopsy) of the just concluded general election ’09. I could not resist myself from wondering how these writers come to know about the thoughts going on in the minds of common people.

In one of the analyses of the result, the writer has claimed - people voted for stable government. Not only that, the people decided that only congress party can give the stable government. I never come across any body who is bothered about the stability of the government, nor are they worried about the expenses due to frequent elections. The people I have met may be very few. Certainly I can not claim this as a result of another opinion poll. There is no difference between the fortune teller sitting under a village tree telling your future and the people sitting in the TV channels’ drawing rooms telling the possible outcome of the election. The only difference is the man under the tree at least does not claim any thing scientific. In that sense he is more truthful in his approach.

Another analysis says that congress crushed other parties in the election. In the very next paragraph the author says that the smaller parties behaved as the spoilers. Then how can we say that congress’ game plan worked? Does it mean that congress created these regional parties with the aim of spoiling other parties’ winnability? The congress party itself did not believe in their strategies and started looking for post poll allies. Or is it that congress crushed its opponents accidentally? Certainly it is not after going through the performance of Mr Manmohan singh. He just sat there in that chair for five years displaying the skills that he acquired as a bureaucrat.

The party men vote for the party they belong to – whatever be the performance. The elites, who, we assume, think about the stability, performance etc, do not venture out for any election, because their job is before and after the election. Otherwise who will analyse and tell the ill informed uneducated villagers about the condition of the nation. They did not go to the polling booth. The percentage of polling tells the truth.

The recent one from Times of India claims that around 153 MPs won the election securing only 10% of the votes. How can we claim that India voted for continuity or against communal forces? (The polling was less than 50% in many of the constituencies.) We have to assume that the remaining 50% did not bother about who will come to rule.

The communal forces won in some states and rest of India votes against communal parties. So can we say those states which supported communal forces are communal? And the rest are secular? In my personal opinion congress party protected or supported Hindu dominance more than the so called Hindutva forces. There is some substance when Mr Arun Jaitley (I think it is Arun, if my memory is not weak) said that in the past sixty years after independence congress did nothing to uplift the conditions of Muslims. The blame certainly is on congress because congress party ruled more than 40 years. By giving some MP seats and some ministries to a few from a particular community, you can not uplift an entire community. Somehow congress party managed to keep the communal difference continue. BJP was never a dominant party till Babri issue or Shah Bhano case. BJP is communal. Congress too. As far as communists are concerned we can say 100% that they are not communal. Are Communists’ philosophies irrelevant? I do not think so. Like congress and BJP(?), communists need to reinvent their ideas in accordance with 21st century.

This victory is not about communal forces, economy, security or political wisdom. This victory or loss can be attributed only to confusion among the voters. It is like fishing in troubled waters. No one can say who will get how much. This time it is congress. Next time?

The effect of school timing on students’ performance

Every year we celebrate teachers’ day on 5th September. Every school has their way of celebrating this day. In our school we, teachers, take a break and hand over the charge to the students. Except for some administrative staff and one/ two teachers, we go out for a picnic. This year too we would do the same. We take pride on this day for being a teacher. But the question is “how many of us really qualify to be teachers?”
Teachers are supposed to have some qualities – like knowledgeable, intelligent, dedicated etc. Most important quality for a teacher is being concerned (empathetic) about the students’ performance. While interviewing for recruiting a teacher we need to look for this quality in the candidate. All the other qualities can be acquired and nurtured. Or the management can use some HR techniques to bring out the required quality (skills). But being empathetic can not be achieved over one or two workshops. It is the nature of the individual, nurtured over a period of time from childhood. Being concerned is not the prerogative of teachers alone. The management is also expected to be equally concerned.
The managements employ a consultant paying huge amount. Either the consultant does not think in the right direction or the schools do not care about the views of consultant. Let me talk about one such problem - school time.
I recall the Madras High Court order on school timing. The judges advised the school authorities to make the school hours to start from 9:30 AM to facilitate the students coming from far off places. Generally the schools in India start at 8:00 AM and end at 1:30 PM. Some schools run up to 3:00 PM. Let me list out the problems faced by the students due to this timing.

1. Most of the students skip break fast. There are ‘n’ number of books advising about the importance of break fast. But we tend to ignore.

2. Most of the parents are working parents today. They come home late and spend little time with the children in the evening. Early morning they rush the children to school.

3. Generally the reason given for early school timing is fresh mind. Because of the above said reason (point 2) if the child went to bed late, it becomes difficult the next morning to get up early. They may not get time to prepare to go to school. They may not even go to toilet properly. Do you expect the students to have fresh mind?

4. Students go home in the afternoon at around 3 PM when they are exhausted and generally there is no one at home at that time.

5. After school, since the school ends early too, the students have to be engaged for some time, till the parents come home. This encourages private tuitions indirectly. Otherwise you would not see many KG students going for tuition. Mostly tuition for primary class students is a “Day care center”.

6. Enough thought is given by the boards while deciding the exam time. But this is not applied for regular school working hours. Is learning more important or testing?

7. In big cities early school timing makes sense. It may streamline the traffic. In small cities this is not required.

8. School timing should match the target group. For example many schools are built by companies as an employee welfare scheme. The school timing must be convenient to the company and the employees. If the office starts at 9:30 AM, the school can start at 9 to 9:20 AM so that the parents can drop the child at the school and go to the office. The school need not start at 8 AM.

9. The school time must encourage less use of non renewable energy sources. The students must be given enough time to reach the school in their own bicycles. They should not be in position to rush to school in a motorized vehicle.

10. A longer lunch time is preferred one. The lunch time must be at least 50 minutes. Many a students especially young children eat slowly. They should be allowed to have enough food.
Since many do not take break fast, they bring some snacks to school to eat in short recess of ten to fifteen minutes given. Instead of having a good breakfast they eat all junk food to kill the hunger.

11. The energy required to work in the modern day schools is much more than what was needed some two decades ago. The schools have so many activities during and after the school hours that the students become easily exhausted.

12. Teachers when they join the profession young, have more energy and they can cope with the odd timing and longer working hours easily. But as they grow older they would find it very difficult. Longer working hours is the need of the day, not odd working hours.

13. The teacher works with the young minds. He/she is not working with machines. A healthy fresh mind of the teacher is must for the growth of the school. A fatigued teacher will produce only dull students.
The mind will get enough time to get refreshed if the schools start little late i.e. around 9:30 AM. The schools may think that the total working hours is still the same. The teachers leaving the school at 3:00 PM will reach home at around four. He/she has to take care of his/her home (remember most of the teachers are women). And then, it is the next day morning. Where is the time for preparing for the next day class? The two three hours they get is not utilized properly. We can say this two three hours are “not valuable”. So the managements have to devise a way to maximize the human valuable time.

I have listed here what I perceived as problems. The problems can be many. The academic community must take note of these points when they decide the school timings. Let the learning process be happy enjoyable experience. Let the students feel comfortable while coming to school.

Radha Krishna

I was lost in my thoughts after I came home from office. The day was as hectic as ever. I needed a break. Ever since my girl friend Xhuxhu left me looking for a stable peaceful life I am not allowing myself to be left alone. I find some work to keep myself busy. The absence of Xhuxhu makes me feel so lonely. So to divert my mind I took a book and started reading. It was about Krishna, the avatar of God in human form.

I just remembered the joke about Krishna. If Krishna does, it is leela and if I do, I am deela. The Hindu God is described in mythology as he lived a life that any man would hate to throw away. Reading the book slowly I was drawn into the picture of Krishna and Radha in my mind.

Krishna is working as a science teacher, teaching the young children the basic principle of the world he created. Wearing a formal dress he approached the children with a smile, a smile which no one could resist, and a smile which has the power to bring life in everybody’s face. All his students loved him. The girls brought him flowers every day. Boys brought him their doubts. They were awestruck by his knowledge and his power to wade through their doubts. He carried him among the children very gently.

I started thinking that if this is the real Krishna. What happened to his romance? Krishna is supposed to be surrounded by girls. But here is Krishna, surrounded by children!!! This must be kaliyug. Otherwise how come Krishna changed his popular image of being the eternal romantic hero to a humble school teacher?

When I was thinking like that I noticed a gentle breeze carrying jasmine fragrance passing by. I went blind with the fragrance. It took sometime for me to come to consciousness. I was wondering - what is that new found smile in Krishna’s face. This is not the same smile that he throws at his children.

That time, Krishna was sitting on a couch near the reception. The school had a well decorated descent reception with a receptionist whose smile was far from real. Krishna was alone even though there were many around him. It was time to go home. All were waiting for the last bell of the school to ring. I could sense the loneliness of Krishna. He was waiting for someone. There she was. Again the air was filled with jasmine. She went straight to Krishna and asked him, “I want to see a movie. Take me to a movie”

Oh my God! Now I could recall that face. She is Radha. I should have understood much earlier. Why this Krishna came here to work as a teacher? He might have come to know that his eternal love is working here as a KG teacher. I was looking at Radha. There is no doubt why Krishna loves her for so many yugas. Radha is such a beauty. Her lips were small and it looked like a piece of orange in red color. Her eyes were dark and were trying to swallow Krishna.

Krishna obliged to take her to a movie. It was this moment that he waited for four years after joining this school. He was more than happy to be with his love and it did not matter what movie they were going to watch. From that day on Krishna and Radha were together for over ten years. Their love for each other is a folk lore now. They longed to meet each other. They spent many days walking in the park (Brindavan? I am not able to see any cows here; No men; nor any river). I had seen many times Krishna and Radha going for a bike ride with Krishna holding Radha’s hand. Nowadays I do not see them around. Some thing has happened to them. They might have realized their true nature as Krishna and Radha as God and the little cow girl who was in deep love with the Lord.

By this time I woke up from my sleep. Oh that was a dream. I feel still the love of Radha from the bottom of heart. She must be loving Krishna irrespective of Krishna’s state. Krishna must be loving Radha as much as she does.

(PS: I did not tell you about the movie they went to see. It was a Govinda’s movie in Tulsi theatre)