"Please, sir, I want some more." So asks Oliver in Oliver Twist, a novel by Charles Dickens. That was 171 years ago. Literary world is yet to recover from the shock. Now it is IIT and IIM professors asking for more! More shocking!!!
Essentials of a Teacher are: i) he is giver of knowledge ii) he should be hungry to learn more so that he can teach more iii) he should not ask and be content with what is given to him/her. This point alone needs some elucidation.
Gurubrahma – “Teacher is Creator”. How can Creator ask or demand more? What are our scriptures teaching in this regard? Take the examples: Vamana wanted no more than three strides of land from Emperor Bali even though the latter offered more; Lord Rama took partly eaten (already tasted) fruits from Sabari and never complained; Lord Krishna happily took a fist-full of inexpensive flat-rice from Sudama. Teacher is expected to set such equally divine example and be content with what is given. They need not even read epics to learn such a mundane rule. Learn from our politicians. Most Chief Ministers take half-pay or only a day’s wage a month or some take One Rupee a month as a token salary, out of respect for motherland. Now our Congress MLAs are taking only half-pay. Babus are travelling only business/economy, not executive class. One young MP travelled by train. One minister travelled low-cost airliner. One minister, albeit unwillingly, travelled cattle-class. They are all renouncing their rights and privileges and Teachers asking more? If our Politicians are content with less, why are these Professors dissatisfied with their regular pay? This defies all logic.
One or two people in the country grumbled about the double standards of the Government in dealing with the demands of Professors and Air India pilots. One spokesperson of Ministry of Civil Aviation clarified:
“These critics are an ill-informed lot. In the first place, they should know that the subject matter pertains to two independent ministries and hence there is no question of double standards. Next consideration is Professors are down-to-earth and grounded lot. Our commercial Pilots, everyone must know by this time, fly up to high altitude of 40,000 feet and they are all highflyers.”
It was not my intention to communicate in an earlier comment to a post that we should remain oblivious to the situation/plight of our professors.
ReplyDeleteTo draw up from your post,culturally we regard our teachers to be Brahma,Vishnu,Maheshwar personfied.
It is the duty of the teacher to lead a student from "tamas(darkness)" to "jyothi(emlightenment)"[quote: Tamasoma Jyothirgamaya], and in turn it becomes the duty of the beneficiary to imbibe and propagate these values while respecting(this in my opinion is more out of gratitude)the guru.
Coming to the point of the IITs,IIScs and IIMs losing their sheen on the account of excessive governmental intervention through their various numerous policies be it reservations or pay structure is definitely a point of concern.
These institutes being the pioneers of Research and Development should be encouraged to continue to do so rather than be riddled with administrative and other firvilous issues.
Now to say that our professors needed to learn from our politicians,who in the name of salaries take a rupee a month and so on,I can understand was satarical with some comic thrown in.
At this point I am prompted to quote a Kabir Das doha,I learnt while in school: Saayeen itna deejiye jamein kutumb samayein,mein bhi bhookha na rahoon sadhu bhi bhooka na jaye.
In reality,it is probably a tough thing to practise given the magnetic spell that lucre can create.