When we talk of doing Charity

Go to any of the sacred places around the country you will discover that people dole millions of rupees every day there, but in their own home turf what they really do? A beggar stands in front of their home for 15 minutes, but no one comes out to give 2-3 chapattis to him!!! This is the irony of doing charity. That is, we do charity when we want, where we want! Not when/where it is needed...

What charity really stands for?

Charity: a system of giving money, food or help free to those who are in need because they are ill, poor or homeless, or any organization which is established to provide money or help in this way. This is a complicated definition given by Cambridge Dictionary. But in a more ground to earth definition it simply means: Helping somebody who is in need of it. 

We are fooling ourselves if we think that our Gods are need of charity, or work of humanity can be done at these places only. Yes people say that it gives them a sense of calmness when they do that, but have they ever tried to give help to a hapless? Believe me this short act of wisdom will give you thousand times more pleasure than at those places at the lower cost.

When we dole out money in a grandiose occasion, what really happens is more than 40 percent of our money goes to state government’s deposit, which then gets lost on some unconstructive activities. 20-30 percent is wasted in maintenance. Rest of money is used inefficiently.

What better we can do?

I always believe a help, directly given, is hundred times better than dolled out in religious places. We can do it plethora of different activities, which will create a positive impact on at least few lives directly, in return will give you a sense of satisfaction, like: helping 2-5 children from poor families to get education up to 12th standard, giving bicycle to a physically challenged child, helping a girl from poor family in getting married, helping a cast discriminated person, helping a poor in getting rid of corrupt bureaucrats,and there are millions more ways.This is a more pragmatic way of doing charity. There are thousand of intermediaries available online which could help you do this.

Is Self Satisfaction a Must?

Getting a sense of satisfaction in any activity is good, but can’t we make it’s affect long lasting? It’s a very unhealthy trend nowadays that people are indulging more and more in self procurement. They are choosing a path, which goes away from doing well to others. They have become such a short sighted animal that they can’t look long lasting happiness they may get by supporting the needy.

Why should I do it?

Because, this is the best example you can set of your humanoid. Yes we are not humans; instead we are machines in the shape of humans-“Humanoids”. Because if we were humans; we should be doing things which would characterize it. Those characteristics include helping mankind.

If you enjoyed the column, contribute by commenting and liking below!

Sign up for free ideas8bottom.com posts (<--see left).

Proliferation of Engineers

Post written by Anshul Gupta. Follow me on twitter.

Engineering; ones upon a time considered to be a prestigious career option. But time made it, a by default choice for all. Today engineers are roaming around like mosquitoes. As a rule quantity always comes at the cost of quality, as a result most of engineers today are unemployable. I would like to comment in this situation by saying that when government allowed commercialization of colleges in India, they virtually allowed instruments of unemployment generation in the country. Making the situation so severe that every body no calls himself a deserving candidate for the job available any where in the industry.

Instruments of Unemployment generation

It is not true that the above title sounds cynical; in point of fact it is the truth that is sounding acidic. I am neither saying that government should abolish all these colleges from India nor that students shouldn’t get the opportunity to be engineers. What I am saying that unbridled burgeoning of these institutes, without any solid watch dog authority, actually making them instruments of profit, for whom the driving principle is greed, instead of a larger social cause of making a society a best place to live for better people.

These so called educational institutes fulfills millions of dreams (while working in faulty & archaic educational system) of becoming an engineer, but what if they are unemployable? What if they are monoliths who can’t do, without a job in their respective field? Does it matter any more? People send their offspring to different colleges across the country to make them engineer, to make them employable, to make them better, so what if they fail? Nothing, except their parents will lose their hard earned money, except that student will lose his some good productive years & an unspoken list of things, personal & social.

People will argue here that our industry whether it is IT, manufacturing or banking etc needs qualified engineers, so why not be an engineer when situation demands that? But at the same time they escaped the significance of the word ‘qualified’, pictured above. Take the case of Bhopal for conscience. In Bhopal until a few years ago there were around 4-5 engineering colleges but …Oh my GOD such a huge demand? That hugely magnified demand created a big opportunity for several people to convert their black money into green, by developing a state of art corridor of colleges in & around Bhopal. And that corridor now deploys more than 70 engineering colleges. Please mark, that these numbers are still in developmental state!!!

Today’s situation yells that, if you have faced a pre-engineering test, than you are an engineer by default & it doesn’t matter that your test score is zero or in the vicinity of that.

Are engineers alone?

No. Engineers are neither alone nor the foremost in achieving this feat. In fact this trend was stated in by Art & Commerce fields & gradually engineers conquered them all. Third eye saw that most of these colleges are in fact either owned or patronized by politicians. Don’t ask me what is this third eye!!!

Wake up Call

Remember behind all these instruments of unemployment generation are a gigantic chain of coaching institutes, room/flat/hostel owners making a kill. Wakeup call says don’t go follow the herd. Make your own choice using full conscience possible. These guys are here to fool you. Besides making choice of only good colleges we should not loose our sight on present opportunities before us.

Ragging in Educational Institutes

Post written by Anshul Gupta. Follow me on twitter.

Ragging: It is one of the issues which is paralyzing our society now a days austerely. And I think nothing can define it more precisely. Lots of lives have been lost to it but this menace is still continuing. And that’s in an educated environment like college & school. Why it is so? I consider it to be a major topic of debate but more importantly it is a major subject of introspection, if we proudly consider ourselves to be human while remaining voiceless.


History of Ragging

Let me start with the history of ragging, how it started in educational institutes? And how is still uncontrollable even after so much of awareness creation and law making done by the government?

There is no evidence when & where it started but when educational institutes were happening to burgeon around the world, more and more student were becoming educated. Parallel to that complexity & hard work needed in education grew. Students were required to be better equipped to beat the competition. Then gradually a trend started to subdue some of the burden of higher education by allocating a little work to the juniors. Lethargy had become one of the synonyms of those peoples. Soon those ways of allocation of ones own responsibility went physical from psychic methods. And then more innovative strategies were brought into picture like: ghajni hair cuts, slapping, forcing to do obscene acts and million more….In a euphemism people named ragging as a way of interaction between seniors & juniors. Here objective was clear but intentions were wrong. I myself have seen student being molested. Both girls and boys are equally prone to this malpractice enjoying complete impunity even under the law!!!


Psychic Reasons behind

Many psychologists around the world have observed several psychological facts behind the making of this phenomenon termed ragging. Some of them, from their studies & my own understanding are given here:

 People who face ragging tend to rag others when come on driver’s seat; this is the most prominent reason behind its permanence.

 Weak; either physically or mentally people tend to join this malarkey.

 Lean family background and improper caring during childhood of a person is sometimes greatly responsible for ragging others.

 People now these days consider it to be a fashion statement.

 One reason which makes controlling this menace largely impractical (that people don’t consider) is that in almost all colleges ragging is virtually supported by the faculty itself of the college. I tried to find out the reasons behind. And the answer is –To stop the possible arrogant behavior of juniors before faculty.
Ragging does the job of terrorizing students while they are in their launch so that future will see more responsible acts by them in front of their faculty. I call those faculties- “Respect Mongers”, who don’t care about doing their own job sincerely, rather more anxious about getting artificial respect!!! Believe me, if these people (faculties) have real worth in them to be respected, they will get it in abundance.


Some Myths about Ragging

Before I call it, let me Wright in for you some myths about ragging that people believe to be truths. These are:

 Ragging is the best & fastest way to build junior-senior relationship.
No. How you can think about an honest relationship, when the basic building block of the relationship is inhumanly treacherous? If somebody really wants to make a healthy senior-junior relationship, then please help them (juniors) rather then troubling them.

 Ragging makes a junior tough & smarter. So face it.
Complete rubbish. Do you think all the successful people who are tough or smart, because of ragging? Ragging is a tool in the hands of seniors for making fun of juniors & nothing else.

 Ragging increases the respect of seniors in the minds of juniors.
Believe me. Nothing can be more false than this. As I wrote earlier in case of faculties of colleges. They (juniors) are seeing the real you!!! Behind every, so called respect a seniors gets, there is long list of f**king things, that a senior would never love to hear.

One thing that is always true of ragging. It takes away the humanity of a human by an inhuman…

Education System in India

Post written by Anshul Gupta. Follow me on twitter.

Most of us have a proper educational background, even than there is something that most of us are still missing!!! Thinking…..what it is? It's education!

From a historical point of view, our education system was based on ethics, values, principals, free flowing of ideas, innovation, and mutual respect but now a day it is based on profit, jobs(placement), cramming, and mutual agony.

India was ruled by Britishers for almost 200 years and during those years every thing was modified the way, they wanted. So was our education system. Britishers started this systems of education in which students are molded to serve their owner, where employees are generated rather than owners. Because they wanted servants not scientists.

After understanding the depth of the issue: We need a completely revolutionized education system in India (& around the world). Several sanguine people suggested a new education system in India and few changes were made in CBSE & NCERT, but only in syllabus. After judging the needs of economy, government allowed private institution to operate in this space, but what happened? Today we have world’s largest army of young, educated but unemployable population in the world!!! They are designed to do a particular jab, so they can't do anything else!!! Absolute rubbish. In reality, they are the flawed product of the system which are designed to server their owner.

When we talk about changes in our education system what we actually need is:

 Better institutional infrastructure where lab instruments really work.

 Change teaching methodology: From memorizing to practicality (independent of memorizing).

 Focus of education should be broader.

 Board of governors should be intellectuals from the society rather than politicians!

Today, in many colleges most of experimental instrument are just for showing purposes. Because if you touch them, they will shatter into pieces .Computers in labs are sometimes good only for playing cards, old screw gauges, optical & electrical instruments are beyond allowable limit of error, mechanical motors are ideally idle most of the time. And what worst you want in getting educated?

The most important revolution needed in education system is the methodology adopted for teaching. God knows what we are going to learn by memorizing things which are seldom relevant in current context. Instead, the focus of teaching should be on showing practical process going behind that huge pile papers. It may be a complex demand to fulfill, because of lack talented people in this sector (Because, teaching a secondary choice for people...is you don't get a job, you can always become a teacher!).

The next important thing is to brainwash the earlier thinking. We need to look at the situation from the lenses of rationality; Creating innovative minds will help society achieve its real objective that is making life better.

Current capitalistic form of economy wants more servants than innovators, which is the biggest dilemma our society facing today.

Now let’s come to the last point i.e. Board of governors: These people are in the charge of making policy decision at the local level. Board of governors should consists of intelligentsia rather than politicians. Object here is very clear & well understood. In fact politicization of education is the worst thing that have ever happened to education system.