Diwali

Diwali - The festival of lights. It literally translates to 'a series of lamps'. It is said to be a celebration of the victory of the good over the evil. There are many legends and stories associated with it. It is said that the celebration of Diwali started in the Treta Yugam. When Lord Rama returned to his capital, Ayodhya, after defeating the evil king Ravana, the citizens of Ayodhya lit lamps all over Ayodhya in celebration. Ever since, lamps are lighted all over the country, every year on the day of Diwali.

A lamp signifies light, knowledge and wisdom, the absence of evil and, of course, celebration. Fire is the soul of  a lamp. Fire signifies valour, courage, and victory. Initially, the celebration of Diwali was mainly about lighting lamps, making and sharing sweets and performing special prayers. Eventually, with the growth of sciences, firecrackers were introduced as a way of celebration.

Firecrackers were initially simple bright things which burnt with colour and bright flames. Slowly, some explosive crackers were introduced for the thrill of it. But off late, it is only these 'bombs' that dominate the festival itself. Also, since there is not much to see in the bursting of bombs, people have started bursting them all the time. Whether it be morning, afternoon, evening or night, the air is filled with booms and bangs. The bombs are burst everywhere, every street and every corner. There are also some very powerful kinds of bombs, making a very loud boom.

But is this the true spirit of Diwali? Today, during Diwali, the streets look like battle fields! Bombs bursting in front of every house! It is also a hurtful reminder of the fact that the people have forgotten the true spirit of Diwali. Forget Diwali, they have even forgotten how to act humane. Every time a bomb is burst, the large sound that it produces startles babies and aged people. Heart patients are affected and so are the mentally ill. It affects the babies even when they are in the womb. Why limit it to just humans! It affects even the birds and animals. Birds are scared out of their nests and animals are too scared to be anywhere. They just run wildly in fear on the roads. Animals too have young ones which could easily get scared. A cat gave birth to 3 kittens just 2 days before Diwali and today it was too scared to even drink some milk. I saw dogs running and trying to hide in whatever nooks and corners they find in our homes, and then being mercilessly shooed away by the house owners. I saw a dog trying to save its puppy from the bomb and the puppy standing perplexed between two houses where bombs were being burst, too scared to run either way and with eyes filled with fear, confusion and helplessness. Seriously, do we really need such crackers?

There was a time when Diwali was all about lights. Lamps were lit all day and all night and colourful bright crackers were burst in the nights. It was a time when Diwali was celebrated as a festival for all. A few days before Diwali, people used to go to the houses of everyone they knew to share sweets and wishes. On the day of Diwali, they'd light lamps all over, they'd wear new clothes given by the elders, they'd make more sweets to offer to the Gods, they'd go to the temple first thing in the morning and then would spend the rest of the day with their families in celebration. In the evenings they would light the lamps again and would start bursting crackers. This was a time for everybody. People in the whole street would get together, would share everything from wishes to crackers to sweets to clothes, the elders would watch the children bursting colourful crackers under the watchful eyes of their fathers and uncles. The women would now share the sweets made on that day with all their neighbours.The entire week in which Diwali falls would be filled with an air of spirituality and celebration. This was Diwali even 10 years ago.

Today, we say technology has developed. We have gained so much from it. But what about all that we have lost? Diwali, today, has become more of a ritual than a celebration. A ritual to burst noisy crackers all day. From around 10 days before Diwali, people start bursting bombs. Day and night the bombs go off with no prior warning. Nobody goes to anyone's house any more. They simply send the Diwali wished as sms's or tags on facebook or as e-cards. On the day of Diwali, people get up whenever they want, wear something new just for fun, and watch TV all day. When there's nothing good on TV they burst the bombs. Nobody lights lamps anymore and the night sky is as colourless as on any other day. People burst the bombs mostly, and so the elders don't come out of the house. Nobody shares anything with the neighbours, they don't even burst the bombs together. Instead, they compete on who's bomb makes more sound. They don't care that their attitude is hurting many humans, animals and birds around them. What once was a festival for all, is a mere ritual today, for we have become so modern. we have lost our humanity. We have lost our culture. We have lost the traditions, passed down to us but all our ancestors. We have brought down the glory of our civilization - the oldest and the most cultured of all civilizations on earth. We have lost everything. Yes, I am old school, but at this rate, who knows, the future generations might even consider it a day to burst the hideous bombs alone.

Happy Modern Diwali! 

Introduction of Tamil as a Medium for Education in Engineering

"Good morning"
"Good morning, sir!"
"So all of you know what a Group Discussion is and what you have to do, right?"
"Yes, sir!"
"OK. Your topic is The Introduction of Tamil as a Medium for Education in Engineering. Start thinking now. I'll be back in a minute."

We were given a minute of brainstorming, it being the procedure. Quite frankly, this was the first time I took this topic seriously. I had heard about such a proposal earlier through news and other media, but had always found the idea absurd and had never thought that it would ever become reality. But here it was. This complex, bizarre and absurd issue was on its route to reality.

Firstly, what does 'Introduction of Tamil as a Medium for Education in Engineering' mean? It means henceforth all engineering textbooks will have tamil copies, the medium of learning and presenting(exams) engineering concepts would be in tamil too, even the lectures would be in tamil. Not that there will be no engineering in english, but there will also be a separate tamil curriculum. This brings a scary thought - disregard leading to the denial of other languages, mainly our national language.

The main arguement supporting this scheme was that when education is provided in the individual's mother tongue it is always easier for the student to understand and reproduce the concepts. But how far?

The world is on a scientific hustle and India on its race to development. In this scenario, could a student who knows only 1 language that too a language that is limited to one part of one country compete with a world of experts? Is knowledge limited to understanding the concepts? In my opinion, knowledge is only partly knowing and mostly the ability to communicate this knowledge to others. Communication is the backbone of knowledge. It would be impossible, even for the smartest mind in the world, to actually acquire knowledge when it is not communicated to the individual in a proper manner. So such a move not only breaks down the backbone of knowledge and education, it also makes the student automatically incapable of pursuing his/her career outside the borders of tamil.

Engineering is an immensely vast field with infinitely many innovations occuring every single day. Engineering itself has many branches and these streams are further divided into sub-streams. There are innumerous experts in various engineering streams and sub-streams scattered around the globe. Most write and publish technical books which, eventually, find their place in our libraries as referrance materials and textbooks. It is humanly impossible to literally translate all these books into a completely different language. Thus the student is at loss since he/she would have access only to a limited number of books. This itself limits the scope of an ever evolving field for the student.

Let us consider a hypothetical situation in which all the books are literally translated to tamil. Tamil is an old language. A minimum of 4000yrs old. Translating something into another language does not mean writing the same word with the same sounds using a different script. Translation in this context means to create meaningful sentances using equivalent words without changing the actual meaning if the sentance. So will tamil have the suitable words that describe the present engineering concepts properly? India had undergone a lot of changes in the past 1000yrs. Invasions and influences of not only domestic but also foreign cultures and languages has affected literally all societies of all parts of the nation. This blend has now become the foundation for our unity and tolerence. Similar changes have occured with tamil too, since in reality, in the society pure tamil is not spoken. Colloquial tamil is enormously corrupted by these influences. But the translation would require pure tamil. So now the student will have to learn tamil all new. The British introduced the english medium of education in India. Now, after nearly 300yrs, the people are starting to get accustomed to english as a medium for communication and have started to understand its importance in the world. Under such circumstances, is it necessary to dig out an old language? I am not against the conservation of tamil. It is one of the most ancient languages in India and is an asset to the country. Yet, 'conservation' does not entirely justify its inclusion in engineering.

A language, even if it is only a tool for communication, must be respected for its existance and for enabling us to communicate. India is a country of hundreds of languages and dialects, all of which must be respected equally. But when in one part of the country, the importance for one particular language is elevated, it automatically reduces the importance for other languages. This wouldn't cause much unrest if the suppresed language is not a very popular one in that area. But in this case the languages which would be suppressed would be English and Hindi - the most widely spoken languages in the country. This would definitely setoff unrest, not only within TN but in other states as well. The states will start competing about how each state chucks out other languages and ultimately the unity prevailing in the nation will breakdown. This would reduce the linguistic tolerance among the citizens and will poison young minds with the venom of linguism.

Furthermore, this move will invoulantarily bring disregard of other languages like english and hindi. Even if it is taught as a language, only a few might take these languages seriously, and hence only those handful would get at least a chance to compete. TN or atleast Chennai is not a place where only tamilians live. It is a metropolitan city with thousands pouring in by the day. In the midst of such variety of cultures, introducing an additional tamil medium apart from the existing english medium will create a bias in the society leading to the collapse of harmony.

An engineering degree is not limited to the time the student spends at college. It is more concerned with the future of the engineer. Afterall, future is also an important aspect of education. The moment a student steps out of the college his future is forked into higher education and career. When a student studies in tamil medium, as mentioned above, only a handful of students out of thousands will have english skills and it will be only these students who would be able to step outside Tamil Nadu. Today, under the english medium,engineering students form colleges in TN are able to go not only to other parts of the country but are also capable of going to foreign countries for higher studies. But an average tamil medium student will be confined to TN for any kind of higher studies due to his lack of skills. Even across the TN border atleast hindi ( which is our national language) is needed. As for career, the student will again be stuck inside TN and could go nowhere else in pursuit of his dreams and goals. It would be like a tamil medium student is constrained inside an invisible cage, losing his/her fundamental right to freedom. Even if one such engineer manages to find a job outside TN, he/she might not gain acceptance in the other society simply because the society they come from is biased.

Moreover, not knowing a language spoken fluently by many others automatically creates an infriority complex in an individual. The employee would feel tounge tied and the others would simply feel irritated to have such an individual amongst them. In the hasty rush for advancement, no one would have the time or patience to help this individual. This will only push that particular employee more towards depression.

Considering the same hypothesis mentioned above, the engineering graduate from tamil medium not only has limited knowledge but is also trapped inside TN for his career. As the number of tamil medium engineering graduates increases, most employers will have two basic options - either to appoint any wise graduate, irrespective of his medium of learning or to give priority to tamil medium graduates as both the employer and employee are in TN. The former would give rise to the old problem of unemployment, which after so many years the government has been able to control, because, every year new batches of tamil medium graduates will be ready for employment. When under the english medium, the graduate can always try another city of state if he/she is not lucky in one. But when the student has been educated in tamil medium, he/she will be incapable of not only trying their luck in other parts of the country, but if they are not at par with the english medium students in knowledge, will also be incapable of getting employed. Again since their education itself is very limited, only a handful might be able to compete with the english medium students. The result of the latter case is simple - lag in technological advancements due to lack adequate exposure. Here only the case of TN is discussed, but this issue and discussion applies, of course, for all states.

"OK! Now you can start."
"Introduction of Tamil as a medium for education in Engineering. What it means is..."