Lecturer, Centre of Advanced Study
Department of History
AMU, Aligarh

terey waadey pe jiye ham to yeh jaan jhoot jaanaa

ki khushi se mar na jaatey agar aitbaar hota (Ghalib)

Apart from the wilful neglect of economic development, law&order, road, electricity, the greatest harm done by the Laloo-Rabri regime in Bihar was to the education system. The duo pursued a conscious, studied politics of allowing the degeneration of the educational institutions/campuses.He was absolutely convinced that this will cause a massive flight of the middle class from Bihar, giving an absolute comfort to the political and bureaucratic ruling elites of Bihar.

The much awaited replacement of the regressive regime of the Laloo-Rabri duo by the apparently suave, sincere, honest leader like Nitish Kumar wasreceived with great expectations.This expectation was even greater among the educated unemployed youth and academic communities. The University/college teachers/employees have got most(not all) of the things given by the UGC, something foolishly missed and neglected by the then governor, Buta Singh and his patron, the Congress led UPA government at the centre.This limited sincerity of the Nitish led government has given it a moral authority to take on the Vice-Chancellors of the universities of Bihar with regard to streamlining the academic calendar.

But the recent announcement by the Nitish led government to recruit 2.36 lakhs of teachers (from the Primary Schools to the Inter Colleges) have given more despair and sorrows than hopes and joys.Rather than recruiting the trained (Basic Training/B.Ed.) teachers on full pay scales (e.g. Basic pay of Rs 4500 + allowances for primary teachers, Rs 5500+ allowances for TGTs in High Schools and Rs 6500+allowances for the PGTs in Inter colleges), the government has decided to pay them a fixed salary of Rs 4000 to Rs 7000. This is a monumental irony, a horrible crime being perpetrated by the government against the people of Bihar.These kinds of ignominious pay scales have shatttered the educated unemployed youth of Bihar.The trained teachers, by the rules, had an assured employment before Laloo's arrival as the Chief Minister of Bihar in 1990. Laloo robbed them off, even though they had preferred to go for teaching and investing their two valuable years of the career for the Basic Training.Nitish had promised them to do the justice, but he was advised against doing this and even after the regime change the affected candidates are back to square one.Even the pre-existing sanctioned posts are decided to be filled up by the underpaid teachers.

The message is clear.While the rich students will/can go to the costly but quality Public schools, the poor students will suffer from being taught by the underpaid therefore incompetent and frustrated teachers. It's quite obvious that talented people with ability, commitment and passion for teaching will prefer to run away from Bihar.

Adding insult to injury, the recruitment process, that has been announced by the Nitish led government, is equally shattering and hopeless, giving way to every kind of evils and doing away with the meritocracy. This is an open secret that the invigilation of examinationa and the evaluation of answer scripts, have displayed variations from year to year, resulting into disproportionately high or low marks secured by the students. Therefore written tests through competitive exams would have been the wiser and more prudent way of recruitment (notwitstanding the administartive starin).

While all these wrongs are being committed on the front of the policy by the NDA government in Bihar, the oppositional political formations are silent. The RJD-Congress-CPI-CPM don't have the moral authority to launch any campaign(inside the Assembly or on the streets) against the decision, because their performance, while in power, on this front have been absolutely disgusting.

Paswan's LJP has now resolved to revive the painful politics of rallies, dislocating the normal puiblic life, without addressing (with any degree of sincerity) the agenda of the recruitment of horribly, outrageously underpaid teachers.

Various Association of School/college/university teachers are as much weak, visionless, corrupt, inefficient, immoral as any other criminalised/lumpenised political formations. The conscience keepers of the society consisting of the intelligentsia, mediamen, teachers, advocates, doctors and other professionals are suffering from the same diseases/syndromes.That's why the late Arvind N. Das had reached an inevitable conclusion that the Bihar's intelligentsia is unintelligentsia (see his book Republic of Bihar, Penguin, Delhi, 1993). No wonder then that the student movements of the campuses and other youth movements are absolutely synonymous to the lumpens/criminals on the streets.The student leaders have got a role model in Laloo and nurse high aspirations of becoming chief minister, railway minister.After all a student leader like Laloo could occupy such high positions and charisma only through theatrics, gimmicks, rhetorics and mockery. Not only this. If one of the news reportings regarding Laloo have to be believed, he started/pursued his political career also through organising the theft of bicycles in Patna.

All these things are ominous to Bihar and therefore to India also giving rise to frustration, tension and violence.Does one have any reason to believe that the Nitish led government will consider revision of the horrific decision that it has taken with regard to the recruitment policy and pay scales of the teachers in Bihar?May one hope that the likes of Prakash Jha, Shekhar Suman,Shatrughan Sinha will raise their voices?

I, for one, being an incorrigible optimist, can only recall Faiz, who says:

dil naa-umeed to naheen, naakaam hi to hai

lambi hai gham ki shaam magar shaam hi to hai.