(Un)Happy Teachers’ Day
Had Dr. Radhakrishnan been alive, he would not have celebrated his birthday today. He’d have been aghast seeing the plight of teachers. Wishing all the teachers of the country a ‘Not so happy teachers’ day’. The pious occupation of being a teacher is witnessing its record low. Of late, it is the teachers who are at the receiving end.
The recent incident of a woman school teacher being beheaded by a class tenth student in Jharkhand came as a shocker to the entire teaching community. He not only beheaded the teacher but ran around the village with chopped head in his hand for hours together. It is the most heinous crime ever done to malign the sanctity of the pious institution of teaching learning. From last some months teaching institutions particularly schools have been in news for all the wrong reasons. A teacher is subjected to everything from abuses to stabbing to taking bullet shots of his pupils.
Despite being the most vulnerable and victims, the authorities put the blame on teachers themselves. This year many private schools and National Independent Schools Alliance (NISA) have decided to observe a black day on 5 September to protest against the arrest of Support Staff, Principals and Schools Management of Private Schools. There are numerous cases where the schools have become soft targets for the parents and government agencies to pass the buck. The private school association of Uttar Pradesh has decided to show their protest for the day by tying black strips on their hands. This is probably the first time in independent India where teachers in such large numbers are showing their objections openly.
The parent-teacher solidarity is at its all-time low. Of late, it has become a norm to blame school and teachers for every wrong doings of a child. The parents are not willing to take responsibility of their neglect. The entire teaching fraternity is living in a constant threat of being blamed for none of their actions. Any misconduct of the child is bound to fall on the school and teachers. This growing culture of rebuttal from parents has kept the schools on backfoot. It has been seen that, the schools are no longer enjoying a healthy parent teacher association. Gaining a written consent for everything as low as taking them to laboratories and music & dance classes from parents have become a standard operational procedure for schools these days which was otherwise considered a part of their normal routine. The element of trust has almost wiped out from the teaching institutions. What are we teaching to our kids subconsciously? We are forgetting the fact that we are creating future humans without emotions by these actions of ours.
In today’s education system the entire focus is on the kids, nobody is paying any attention to the wellbeing of teachers. The Human Resource policies for teachers are weakest amongst equivalent industries. The infrastructural hurdles in the government schools and salary constraints of private schools are ever existing. While there are still a significant number of govt. schools which lack basic facilities like drinking water and toilet, on the other hand there are private schools that didn’t even offer a chair to teachers in classroom. Both private and govt. schools (excluding a few elite schools) face staff crunch and the existing staff has to support additional periods and classes. The private schools running across the country has no fixed remuneration policy employing teachers in as low as two thousand rupees per month. With these challenges to face every day, a teacher is the most abandon employee in the white-collar segment.
Almost all the laws are child centric and a teacher is left with no option but to prove his own innocence. The latest example of a 92-year-old retired teacher being booked under false charges of POCSO is an eye-opener. The entire repute earned after decades of service to the nation is malignified overnight. It is anticipated that these laws might also met their fate like the Dowry Prohibition Act which is widely misused.
The need of the hour is to constitute an autonomous body under the constitution to uphold and safeguard the rights of millions of teachers who are always regarded as nation builders. There should be a uniform wage system for the teachers so that the sanctity of the institution is preserved. The occupation of being a teacher should be made open to all the intellectuals across domains so that the quality of education is improved. Affiliation laws should also keep a vigil on ‘hire and fire’ policy of school owners. The government should implement the recommendations of Subramanian Committee. An Indian Education Service (IES) should be established as an all India service with officers being on permanent settlement to the state governments but with the cadre controlling authority vesting with the Human Resource Development (HRD) ministry. The outlay on education should be raised to at least 6% of GDP without further loss of time. Compulsory licensing or certification for teachers in government and private schools should be made mandatory, with provision for renewal every 10 years based on independent external testing.
If the glory of teachers kept on deteriorating like this forever, the time is not far away when we will see meaningless institutions producing human beings without any intellect, emotion and vision. Dr. Radhakrishnan has aptly said, “It is not God that is worshipped but the authority that claims to speak in His name. Sin becomes disobedience to authority not violation of integrity.”
