The Plumbing Problem in India’s primary education

Pablo Picasso famously said, “All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” While Picasso would have thought of any child of any nationality in general while having to make such a statement, citizens of Bangalore had a more localized version of it to mull over on the evening of 26th of October, 2017 inside the premises of Alliance Francaise. Eminent Historian and Author Ramachandra Guha extended a warm welcome to American French economist Esther Duflo, who is the Co-founder and Director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) and Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She was delivering the 11th New India Foundation Lecture titled – ‘Every Child Counts; How to fix Primary Education in India?’ Continue reading “The Plumbing Problem in India’s primary education”

NEET and the needless pain

I was skimming through my news feed and for no reason, I was reminded of Carl Sagan. I repeated his words in my head – “We will know which stars to visit. Our descendants will then skim the light years, the children of Thales and Aristarchus, Leonardo and Einstein”. I glanced again at the piece of news I was reading and I was overcome by a sickening pain. The news was all about the NEET fiasco. Continue reading “NEET and the needless pain”

To See Is To Believe?

A circular was read out in the classroom. It had been decided by the school management that students from Std 8th – 10th would be taken on an educational tour to Calcutta. I was in 8th standard then. I was excited enough to convince my parents about the idea. I set my plans straight about the places I had to visit and spent the night taking a virtual tour of the city in my dreams.

Continue reading “To See Is To Believe?”