[Assam] article from outlookindia.com

[Chan Mahanta]

Umesh:

Your associative and inferential skills either must be extraordinary, 
or perhaps require a great deal of maturing. I am not sure which, 
considering that you are a Harvard M.Ed.  With the arguments you put 
up, either you make Harvard appear to be a third rate institution 
that churn out degree collectors lacking even the minimum of 
deliberative skills, or that perhaps you stand out as those 
exceptions to the rule.
I am not sure which is worse under the circumstances.

c-da















At 10:15 PM -0700 6/23/07, umesh sharma wrote:
>C-da,
>
>I don't have to be a civil engineer to get a road constructed. Under 
>my father's guidance I have got large pieces of road and drainage 
>system constructed for Jaipur School. Ofcourse, it was my father's 
>attention to detail wchich identified most of the faults - which 
>even qualified architects overlooked - quite the contrary - the 
>architect relied on our feedback to make relevant changes in the 
>map. And he is a good architect - by Indian standards.
>
>I'm sure you can be a great businessman without an MBA from a 
>renowned business school - if you have attention to detail and are 
>eager to learn and experiment.  As the saying goes: If you have 
>confidence and ignorance then success is sure (from Reader's Digest 
>of long ago).
>How about Levees in New Orleans - which failed despite USA's 
>excellent education system?
>
>Umesh
>
>Chan Mahanta <cmahanta at charter.net> wrote:
>
>Ram:
>
>
>
>
>At 8:13 PM -0600 6/22/07, Ram Sarangapani wrote:
>
>>C'da,
>>
>
>
>Thanks for forwarding this rather well-written article. I must say, 
>it makes wonderful reading and does make one have second 
>thoughts about the quality of education that most of us have 
>received from India. :)
>
>
>
>
>**** Before you get into raptures on that, allow me to caution you 
>on a very important point: NOT ALL who might have come out of that 
>dysfunctional Indian education system are burdened by its 
>uselessness.  Some had the good fortune of learning better, in spite 
>of it. Dunu Roy is a good example.
>
>
>  > have no argument  with the first point - I do think it is highly 
>possible to teach people to perform and >operate complex procedures, 
>if they are willing to learn and taught well.
>
>*** I am glad.
>
>The IF in "If if they are willing to learn and taught well " has a 
>lot to do with RELEVANCE ,PREPARATION and the qualifications to 
>TEACH. You couldn't teach the fundamentals of land measurement or 
>establish gradient to determine drainage patterns if you did not 
>learn how to do basic arithmetic or the fundamentals of geometry. 
>And none of that could be taught by Srimati Priyanka Saikia , 
>graduate of the dysfunctional university of where -have-you, who got 
>the job by bribing the Babus that lead the non-education system.
>
>
>Let me give you an even more stark example:
>
>You, I am sure, heard of that so-called major drainage improvement 
>project that was undertaken by Guwahati or Assam ( doesn't matter 
>exactly who) which had to be ABANDONED  a few years back after 
>crores of rupees having been spent on it. I remember writing a 
>letter to one of those fearless watchdogs of democracy  at Guwahati 
>asking WHY they don't  say or attempt to find out and inform the 
>public WHY  it had to be ABANDONED?  Needless to say, it was not 
>published.  Much later I heard that  the system had to be abandoned 
>because the ENGINEERS were not aware that the system did not have 
>the gradient to drain.
>
>Obviously these highly trained engineers, who would have done just 
>as well as you or I, had they been
>here in the USA for example, did not know how to survey the terrain.
>
>
>I will give you another example, of a different kind:
>
>Several years back I gave a short talk at my alma mater, Namti 
>Higher Secondary  School, about how to enrich USEFUL science studies 
>at schools with EXPERIMENTAL, hands-on  techniques, by teaching how 
>to hypothesize, how to experiment with changing the variables, by 
>observing the results, by recording them , by graphing them and 
>learning from them. For giving a relevant example, I spoke about Wl 
>Kobi ( Kohlrabi) outputs in a small kitchen garden that everybody is 
>familiar with and involve in rural Assam.
>
>The constant would be how it is usually done.
>
>The variables would be  like:
>
>	Use of mulch ( old newspapers) to control, weeds, a major 
>cause of nutrient depletion
>	and productivity loss.
>
>	Frequency of watering, a major concern in the dry season when 
>they are grown.
>
>	Type of fertilizers, like raw dung versus composted cow 
>manure with organic waste.
>
>	Density of planting ( they grow them very inefficiently  with 
>one plant per two or three
>	square feet of space).
>
>	So on and so forth.
>
>
>The teachers were very excited. They connected with the  concept 
>instantly and wanted to do it. I  wished I could stay to set an 
>experiment up. But I go to Namti for one or two days at a time. 
>Never could help out other than send them a bunch of literature. 
>Don't know if it went anywhere.
>
>How did *I* learn of it? By being involved with our children's 
>science projects at school.
>
>
>
>  >The notion that education in India is totally impractical I find 
>it had to believe. You, me, and most NRIs >have had this didactic 
>education (including Roy). I really wonder, how, Roy & his group of 
>intellectuals >managed to get out of that mold?
>
>*** You should ask ME  that question.  I will tell you someday :-).
>
>
>
>  >Most Indians too have this background too. Then, how is it that 
>they manage to do very well in this >country?
>
>
>*** That is a FALSE yardstick to measure it with.  See if you can 
>figure that out yourself Ram. I like to think you are eminently able 
>to. But if you fail, honestly, let me know. I promise to help :-).
>
>
>  >On the third point, it is quite easy to take pot shots at the 
>Govt. machinery. and its incompetence. While >I commend Roy and his 
>group (are they some anti-dam people:) in taking the trouble to do a 
>better job >teaching than the education system, I wonder, if Roy can 
>recommend that method for the whole >country, and if that will be 
>workable.
>
>
>*** It is NOT a mystery. Many know how to change it. But India's 
>dysfunctional state is unable to change.
>That is where the problem is.
>
>
>I wonder where your naive beliefs about Indian governance spring 
>from: Knowledge  or ignorance :-).
>
>
>c-da
>
>
>
>
>
>>  Even with that didactic//memorizing by rote background, I came 
>>away with a few of things here: :)
>>
>
>
>The first, of course, is that people can be taught (often complex 
>things) even if they have had no formal education.
>
>
>
>The second, of course, is that, I find it a tad preposterous, that 
>Dunu Roy thinks that education in India as "Instead, we have 
>didactic instruction, memorising by rote, and vomiting out useless 
>information for futile examinations... "
>
>
>
>The third, of course, is that according to Dunu Roy, the Govt. is 
>pretty useless, ie. whatever they touched (his illustrations here) 
>have been baseless, miscalculated, and ultimately, Roy and his 
>group, had to go teach the "practical/down-to-earth" stuff to the 
>affected people, and make the corrections.
>
>
>
>I have no argument  with the first point - I do think it is highly 
>possible to teach people to perform and operate complex procedures, 
>if they are willing to learn and taught well.
>
>
>
>The notion that education in India is totally impractical I find it 
>had to believe. You, me, and most NRIs have had this didactic 
>education (including Roy). I really wonder, how, Roy & his group of 
>intellectuals managed to get out of that mold?
>
>
>
>Most Indians too have this background too. Then, how is it that they 
>manage to do very well in this country? How is it that they have not 
>only done well in school in this country, but have proved to be one 
>of the smartest in opening up successful start-ups (not just IT), 
>and doing great.
>
>I don't know. Probably  Roy will tell us.
>
>
>
>On the third point, it is quite easy to take pot shots at the Govt. 
>machinery. and its incompetence. While I commend Roy and his group 
>(are they some anti-dam people:) in taking the trouble to do a 
>better job teaching than the education system, I wonder, if Roy can 
>recommend that method for the whole country, and if that will be 
>workable.
>
>
>
>--Ram
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>On 6/22/07, <mailto:cmahanta at charter.net>cmahanta at charter.net 
><<mailto:cmahanta at charter.net>cmahanta at charter.net> wrote:
>
>Knowledge As Weapon
>
>Ordinary working people have the capacity to learn, to collect 
>information, to look at it analytically, and eventually use it for 
>bettering their own lives. This is, or should be, the central 
>objective of "education". Instead, we have didactic instruction, 
>memorising by rote, and vomiting out useless information for futile 
>examinations...
>Dunu Roy
>
>It was some 30 years ago, in the mid-70s, that we got a glimpse of 
>what the future might hold. We had just purchased 2 acres of land to 
>build a workshop on, in the district of Shahdol in Madhya Pradesh. 
>There had been some argument with the neighbouring owner about where 
>exactly the boundary lay. So one day we dragged out the iron chain 
>that surveyors use, and began measuring the land ourselves. A 
>curious shepherd boy must have witnessed the proceedings, because 
>next day a delegation of solemn farmers from the nearby village paid 
>us a visit. They had heard that we were engineers, they explained, 
>so could we teach them how to measure land? Why, we asked, whatever 
>will you do with it? Well, they explained, the patwari (the 
>government revenue functionary at the village) had been demarcating 
>their lands and they were never sure whether he was doing it right. 
>So we spent the next four hours demonstrating how the chain worked 
>and how to calculate the area. In the process, of course, we began 
>to learn that the chain was called a jareeb, the area was rakba, the 
>khasra number referred to the record in the revenue department, 
>their title was the patta, and the patwari presided over a khatauni 
>in which all secrets were well documented.
>
>
>A week later, the same delegation was back, but looking less solemn 
>and more brashly conspiratorial. Could they borrow our jareeb? We 
>handed over the chain and then, not a little puzzled ourselves, we 
>followed them at a discreet distance. In due course, we arrived at 
>the village and a curious spectacle greeted us. On the farms of the 
>village, the patwari was laying out his chain, and wherever he went, 
>the farmers followed with their borrowed jareeb and laid it out in 
>exactly the same manner. At every halt they would watch the patwari 
>and when he began to enter figures in his notebook, they too would 
>whip out a pencil and scribble on a piece of paper. Rarely had we 
>seen a more harassed looking patwari! At the end of the day, the 
>delegation was back again, beaming from ear to ear. Thank you for 
>the hathiyaar (weapon), they told us, and handed back the jareeb. 
>Can we, we asked them, see what you wrote? They took out their 
>smudged piece of paper and showed it to us. It was covered with a 
>series of numbers in meaningless disorder. But, they grinned, they 
>had taken care not to show it to the patwari! 
>
>This theme of knowledge as weapon has come back to us many times in 
>the last three decades. In the mid-80s, a small party from the 
>Palamau district of Bihar knocked on our door. Could we come to 
>their village and see what the proposed dam on the Auranga river was 
>going to do to their area? We said yes, but provided they were able 
>to wrangle a copy of the DPR (Detailed Project Report) of the dam. 
>Oh, no problem, they remarked, the irrigation department chaprasi 
>(peon) was from their village. So, three weeks later, we were 
>rambling across the farmlands of Palamau inspecting the river and 
>its catchment and comparing it to what was written in the DPR. We 
>were faced with a battery of questions. Look at that river, 
>exclaimed the villagers, do you think it can carry as much water as 
>to irrigate all the lands the department is claiming it will? And 
>can you see the silt in it; how long will it take for the dam to 
>fill up? The department says that this village will come under 
>submergence, and that one will not, when we can clearly see that 
>this village is higher than that one! How can we challenge their 
>views? 
>
>We took four days to instruct a batch of 20 young boys from the 
>surrounding villages how to measure the flow in the river, the silt 
>load that it carried, and the slope of the land.With that, they 
>said, they would be able to take on the project's claims of 
>projected irrigation, the life of the dam, and the extent of 
>submergence. On the last evening, as we were packing to leave the 
>next morning, they eyed us suspiciously. Where, they asked, pointing 
>to the "dumpy" (a kind of telescopic instrument that is used to 
>measure levels), are you taking that? Well, we said, this is our 
>instrument and we are taking it back; if you want one you will have 
>to get it for yourselves. How much does it cost, they queried, and 
>where is it available? The nearest place, we explained, would be 
>Ranchi and it would cost about Rs 3000. And then we retired for the 
>night. Only to be woken up by an exuberant hammering on the door 
>very early the next morning. Here, they said, is Rs 3000 collected 
>from donations by all the villagers, and you can go and buy the 
>dumpy yourself; otherwise how will we fight a yuddh (war) without an 
>astra (weapon)? 
>
>That the yuddh was joined became clear to us when, four months 
>later, a parcel arrived with the postman. It contained a sheaf of 
>papers containing the records of three months of daily measurement. 
>We went to work on the data and came up with some very interesting 
>findings indeed. The river, for instance, carried only half as much 
>water in the monsoon months as the DPR claimed it did. This water 
>also bore a silt load one-and-a-half times that of the figure 
>reported in the project proposal. 25 villages were actually coming 
>into the submergence zone, demarcated by following the full 
>reservoir contour, as compared to the 19 acknowledged by the project 
>authorities. When all these were factored into the calculations the 
>benefits actually came to less than the costs! This was going to be 
>one very unviable dam indeed, we informed the people of Auranga. 
>They, in turn, took the report and propagated it all over the area 
>through posters and leaflets, while the English version was duly 
>sent off to the governments, the media, the courts, and even the 
>World Bank. Today, fifteen years later, the Auranga river remains 
>unbound. 
>
>
>In the mid-90s, we had another set of visitors, but this time from 
>the high ranges of Kullu district in Himachal Pradesh. Their 
>villages and hamlets were being threatened by the declaration of the 
>Great Himalayan National Park. What exactly was this Park, they 
>asked, and how could they protect their families? So, two months 
>later, armed with the relevant documents and reports, we pitched 
>camp in their village. A young bunch of grazers and farmers listened 
>attentively as we explained how the government had commissioned a 
>study in the 80s and how this study, conducted by a pair of 
>specialists from the Pheasant Society in the UK and Canada, had come 
>to the conclusion that only by declaring the Park as a protected 
>area could the rare Western Himalayan Tragopan (a ground-dwelling 
>bird) be saved. And then, as we presented the details of the study, 
>the listeners grew restive. No, they protested, it is not possible 
>for the Tragopan to be disturbed by our herds because it nests in 
>late winter and our grazers go up only in late spring. Even that 
>figure of 25,000 animals is wrong, they objected, our numbers rarely 
>cross 12,000. And it is not us who destroy the herbs, but the Nepali 
>labourers from the Terai, who are unfamiliar with alpine ecology and 
>are hired by the traders in the plains. 
>
>We suggested to them then that they should do their own study and 
>compare their findings with what had been reported by the foreign 
>experts. Very well, they responded immediately, tell us how to do 
>the study. So, for the next two days, we demonstrated to them how to 
>draw transects and conduct animal counts, how to document the 
>diversity of grasses and shrubs, and how to systematically record 
>their observations.As soon as the snows melted, six of them headed 
>towards the alpine meadows, following the same route that the 
>scientists had taken ten years earlier. Two porters who had been 
>taken along to ferry the supplies to base camp (at heights of over 
>3000 metres, one does not run into the occasional tea shop or 
>restaurant!), became so familiar with the routines of measurement 
>that they eventually became part of the study team. Six weeks later 
>they returned, armed with a range of documented observations. A 
>detailed examination of their records showed that they had 
>successfully challenged every one of the findings of the 
>government-sponsored study. In addition, their measurements 
>indicated what was the carrying capacity of the meadows, how 
>ruminants were in fact controlling weed infestation, and how the 
>herbs could be harvested within the boundaries of conservation. 
>
>This much, then, is certain: people fight their struggles for 
>survival based on what knowledge they can create. Each one of the 
>reports and studies cited above (and numerous others that have not 
>been documented in both rural and urban areas) indicates that 
>ordinary working people have the capacity to learn, to collect 
>information, to look at it analytically, and eventually use it for 
>bettering their own lives. This is, or should be, the central 
>objective of "education". And yet, these are simple (and yet very 
>complex) tasks that are not undertaken by our educational 
>institutions. Didactic instruction, memorising by rote, and vomiting 
>out useless information for futile examinations constitute the 
>fundamentals of what passes for education in our schools and 
>colleges. Perhaps there is a purpose to it all. Perhaps another 
>Macaulay is required to explain it to us in yet another Minute. And 
>perhaps, in some not too distant future, a group of young labourers 
>will learn to document their own lives to tear this farce to pieces.
>
>
>A graduate (and post-graduate) from IIT Bombay, Dunu Roy heads 
>Hazard Centre in New Delhi.
>
>
>
>
># You may be missing other accompanying blurbs, related stories, graphics etc.
>Link to this story as it appears on the site :- 
><http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fodname=20070621&fname=dunuroy&sid=1>Knowledge 
>As Weapon
><http://www.outlookindia.com/>www.outlookindia.com
>
>
>
><http://203.200.89.96/sfa/newsuboutlook.asp>MailScanner has detected 
>a possible fraud attempt from "203.200.89.96" claiming to be 
>Subscribe Online: Outlook Magazine
>
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>assam mailing list
><mailto:assam at assamnet.org>assam at assamnet.org
><http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org>http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>assam mailing list
>assam at assamnet.org
>http://assamnet.org/mailman/listinfo/assam_assamnet.org
>
>
>
>
>Umesh Sharma
>
>Washington D.C.
>
>1-202-215-4328 [Cell]
>
>Ed.M. - International Education Policy
>Harvard Graduate School of Education,
>Harvard University,
>Class of 2005
>
>http://www.uknow.gse.harvard.edu/index.html (Edu info)
>
>http://hbswk.hbs.edu/ (Management Info)
>
>
>
>
>www.gse.harvard.edu/iep (where the above 2 are used )
>
>
>
>
>http://jaipurschool.bihu.in/
>
>
>
>Which email service gives you 
><http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mailuk/taglines/gmail/unlimited_storage/*http://us.rd.yahoo.com/evt=48525/*http://uk.mail.yahoo.com>unlimited 
>storage?
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://assamnet.org/pipermail/assam_assamnet.org/attachments/20070624/12368ec2/attachment.html