Selective Amnesia in History

An enigma unraveled

Fifty years ago, on 23^rd January 1957, V.K. Krishna Menon, the most forceful and fearless leader that any nation had sent to the United Nations delivered his 8hour speech on Kashmir, a fitting reply to Pakistan, “It must be planted effectively in your minds that the issue in Kashmir is aggression, that the issue is invasion…” Krishna Menon’s time was one in which India loomed large in international affairs not only in championing the cause of oppressed nations, but in rendering positive assistance in solving knotty issues like the Korean problem. His role in freedom fight is well documented as an unofficial ambassador of the Indian people in London, instilling confidence even in Prime Minister Clement Attlee. Through his mentor and guru Harold Lasky he worked out the plan to appoint Lord Mountbatten, an admirer and friend of Nehru as the last Viceroy to enable a smooth transfer of power from Britain to India ( Ref: Lappier and Collins: Freedom at midnight)

History never forgets such great milestones, but alas, historians do. Such selective amnesia proves handy for some of them who write history with a long term personal goal. This is perhaps what happened to Shashi Tharoor while writing his meticulous volume on independent India “From Midnight to Millennium”. His book decries Nehru’s ‘Socialist Pattern of Society’ as the root cause of all evils in independent India, but plays to the audience by romanticizing the uplift of the downtrodden to positions of power. The story of a village boy who could not enter his (Tharoor’s) house being an untouchable returning to the village as the District Collector and behaving benevolently to his tormentors has the beauty of a fairy tale, be it fact or fiction.

Tharoor’s book discusses a great array of significant persons in the country from statesmen to petty politicians, the feud between India and Pakistan over Kashmir in a cool-headed style, but carefully avoids mentioning the towering personality and patriot who dealt with the problem with an indomitable will and persistence. It is interesting to note that Shashi Tharoor had all UN records at his disposal to write an honest account of the battle fought in the UN and yet he was blind to this illustrious personality who virtually decided India’s foreign policy from ’47 to ’62.

Although every patriot admired Krishna Menon, there were others who understandably hated him. But ignoring him was impossible. The Westerners, US in particular hated him, but took notice of every word he uttered on international issues. He was also feared because of his sharp and witty quips. When the superpowers were piling up “nuclear warheads for world peace” his sarcastic remark was, “I have never heard of a vegetarian tiger”. He was virtually the voice of India.

One admires Shashi Tharoor’s style and remarkable ability to write beautifully no matter what the topic is, and no matter if there is a topic at all. This rare gift has given him many readers and admirers in India who wish well for him. After reading his “From Midnight to Millennium” more than a year ago his determined amnesia on Krishna Menon and his contributions haunted me as an enigma.

Everything fell in place, and the riddle was instantly solved as soon as Shashi Tharoor announced his candidature for UN Secretary General’s position. This august body, buckling under pressure from the US and its allies has deteriorated to a worse condition than the erstwhile League of Nations when Italy invaded Abyssinia (present Ethiopia). All recent UN Secretary Generals looked like scarecrows when Bush and Blair invaded Iraq with impunity, bombed schools and hospitals, and killed women and children in their war of greed for oil. He, as a career diplomat knew better than anyone that one’s political opinions should resonate with that of US even to get across the first round of the competition. In hindsight it is not difficult to fathom his intentions in obliterating a great patriot like Krishna Menon in order to curry favour with his masters who might get jittery at the very mention of that name, whom they had dubbed as a crypto-communist.

Carry on Shashi, no hard feelings. After all, collective memory of the masses is extremely poor.

Post Script: When AK Antony joined the Union Cabinet as Defence Minister most of the Malayalam channels, and newspapers did not remember that he was the second Malayalee occupying that position, Krishna Menon being the first. This collective amnesia can be pardoned because most of the young journalists and reporters have limited their domain of knowledge to irrelevant details on movie stars and cricket players. The slip was due to ignorance and not due to amnesia.

Sorry, Your Lordships !!!

Admission to professional colleges in Kerala and all the protection of social justice will be back to square one in 2007, thanks to the most recent order of the Hon. High Court of Kerala striking down all important clauses of Act 19 of 2006, leaving behind a skeleton of the original Act. This act was intended not only to bring about some amount of social justice in an environment of commercialization and exploitation but to make everyone accountable by following a transparent procedure. One is baffled by the Hon. Court’s dictum that the much lauded single window system is an infringement on the rights of managements. In ruling that the managements could conduct their own entrance tests the Hon. High Court has turned a blind eye to realities.

Private professional colleges collect Capitation Fee (banned by many earlier orders of the Court) from every student. Managements usually do not call for applications through public notice, never specify a last date for application, do not maintain application registers, never prepare any rank list before admission because they simply do not need it. A person desirous of admission approaches the management (Principals are usually kept as scarecrows in the whole affair), bargains wherever possible, pays the capitation fee or donation or whatever else you may call it and secures an application form. Entrance test or no test, the candidate is assured of a seat in the specified branch. In Medical Colleges this amount runs to many lakhs while in Engineering the amount is lower, and depends on the branch, Electronics and Communication quoting the highest. Thus there will be exactly as many applicants as there are seats. They might even conduct an entrance test, but how does it matter if everyone passes? Unless he/she pays the capitation fee a meritorious candidate has no way of collecting an application form and getting enlisted as an applicant. There will be no evidence to show that his merit has been by-passed by money. In fact it was this "unfettered right” that the Act had curtailed and the Hon. Court order has now handed back to managements by dismantling the single window system. Who doesn’t know that their “management entrance test” is the biggest joke played on the public?

Hon. High Court has made an observation that private colleges give quality education that government colleges fail to do. Sorry Your Lordships, the facts tell a different story. Students and parents think that the government, Aided and Govt. Self financing colleges give them a better deal as testified by the rush of high rank holders to these colleges

Table below: 2005 Admission: Highest preferred colleges and the last rank of students admitted to Electronics and Communications Branch (First Round)

College, (Last rank in ECE Branch), Type

1. College of Engineering Trivandrum, (160) Govt.

2. Model Engg. College, Thrikkakkara (518) Govt. SF

3. TKM College Kollam (595) Aided

4. Govt.College of Engg. Trissur (697) Govt

5. M A College, Kothamangalam (787) Aided

6. RIT Kottayam (1505) Govt

7. Sree Chithra Trivandrum (1602) Govt. SF

8. Govt. Engineering College, Barton Hill, TVM (1613) Govt

9. NSS Engg College Palakkad (1766) Aided

10. College of Engg Chengannur (1958) Govt. SF

11. Rajagiri School of Engg & Tech., Ekm (2001) Private SF

12. Govt. Engg. College, Sreekrishnapuram, Palakkad (2357) Govt.

13 Govt. College of Engg. Kannur (2500) Govt.

14. University College of Engg, TVM (3154) Govt. SF

15. Institute of Technology for Women TVM (3191) Govt. SF

16. College of Engineering, Adoor (3474) Govt. SF

17. LBS College of Engineering, Kasaragod (4151) Govt. SF

18. Adi Sankara Inst. of Engg., EKM (4625) Private SF

19. College of Engineering, Munnar (4653) Govt. SF

In this list of 19 Engineering colleges which obviously were considered as top preference institutions, there are only Two Private Self-financing colleges. Somehow our lawyers failed to convince the court that Private self financing colleges do not enjoy the same credibility as the Government sector.

Any amount of data is available to prove that the entry of self financing colleges has caused a drop in the overall standards mainly due to the admission of undeserving candidates through money power. Although the total number of seats has increased many times the output of engineers in the state has increased only marginally, thanks to the enormous number of dropouts (35%) who would never complete their education. This wastage is mainly from the self financing sector.

Luckily Hon. High Court has not struck down the right of Government to maintain academic standards. The previous government, for reasons unknown to academics had reduced the minimum marks for entry (2006) from 50% to a mere pass in Plus Two. This, together with the “unfettered rights” of managements has brought in all kinds of young people to professional colleges. One need not wait until 2010 to know its consequences. Results of first year exams in various Universities will speak out eloquently.

Government is apparently contemplating an appeal in the Supreme Court. From the earlier verdicts it is clear that this would be a losing battle. Instead, a comprehensive law to be implemented in 2008 should be thought of. Meanwhile looking at the left over clauses of the Act the Government should immediately tighten up the academic requirements and ensure some amount of justice to aspiring candidates by doing the following:

1. Ensure that all aspiring students are able to buy the application form and get enlisted as a candidate without paying capitation fee or any part thereof.
2. All eligible applicants should be permitted to appear for the “Management Entrance Exam” and obtain a rank
3. Valuation of papers should be done without the influence of managements
4. A list of successful candidates should be published in the order of ranking.

Managements should be asked to publish the fee structure; any other underhand collection should be treated as a criminal offence. Whatever remains of the Act itself enables the Government to ensure this much.