Khekiye K. Sema IAS (Rtd)
During my earlier years as an Administrative Officer, I had done a stint as SDO (C) in Aghunato Sub-Division way back in 1978-79. I had paid an unannounced visit to Zheyishe Village at 7.30am just 35 minutes drive from Aghunato HQ. The whole village was deserted except for some very old babysitting folks physically unable to go to the kheti. I had intended to see how the village school was functioning. It however surprised me to see the village LP School locked down so early in the morning… no teachers, no students. When I enquired from one of the oldies why the school was closed and also the whereabouts of the teachers and the students, I heard a very amazing story that I now share with you.
This old man nonchalantly said that the school children were all out in the jungle. His answer immediately tickled my curiosity. On a closer enquiry I found that the children were out on an extracurricular subject assigned by the teacher. Having conveniently dispensed his students, the lone teacher in this village had already left the village premises to go shopping at Aghunato Town which comprised of only three and a half number of shopping malls selling a very limited quantity of essential commodities. Perhaps the teacher had run out of salt. “What extracurricular subject?” I asked. “Ohh” he said in a feebly modulated tone, “I saw all the children go home, pick up their ‘akusu’ (traditional bird trapping bamboo contraption) and head for the jungle after their roll call. I am told they have to catch birds”. It was obvious the school session had ended before it had begun. “Catch birds for what?” I questioned. The old man said, “My grandson was saying that the teacher had instructed them to trap birds and bring it home to him by the evening for mark assessment. I’m told the students are given marks according to the size of the birds they catch…the bigger the birds the higher the marks”. I was stumped but continued, “What happens to the birds after marks are given?” The experienced old man replied with a smirk in his wrinkled face, “I seriously suspect the birds are hygienically introduced to axone, chili and salt in the cooking pot of the teacher”. “How often does such extracurricular subject get taught in a week?” I persisted desperately trying to suppress the amusement from my voice. “Ahh I don’t keep counts but by the way the children go to the jungle almost every other day it seems like an important compulsory subject regularly being taught… In fact so regularly that these days many of the children come home empty handed unlike five six years ago… So many of the children get scolded by the teacher and don’t earn marks” said he with a straight face.
My official tour starting from Asukhuto Circle HQ and a three days tracking trip all the way up to Khumishimi village crossing four other villages en route, was an eye-opener as well. Since my visit was pre-notified, all the village schools were at least opened and running. Aghunato falls under economically backward area but the sector that I was traversing were further down in the scale of backwardness… no roads, no electricity, no water supply no nothing. Anyway, what I noticed was that many of the students in these village schools were already fairly well built folks you wouldn’t want to mess around with. The general background review of the functioning of these schools from the elders of the villages threw up one hellova picture. I shall restrain myself from identifying the name of the villages to spare them the embarrassment but it seemed the common standard occurrence in the village schools in the area was this: The village teacher would come to school with his “azuta”(machete) in his ‘asachi’ (wooden dao casing) and a spear which is firmly planted in the school compound next to him; He would then proceed with a roll call: Khumtsa?… “Ani akijeu (present sir)”… “you stand to the right”, the teacher would say. Akhakhu?... Ani akijeu… you stand in the middle. Imusayebo (translated meaning of this name: my elder brother’s Tiffin box)?...Ani akijeu… you stand to the left and this would go on till the roll call is completed. This business of standing right, middle and left was carefully choreographed according to the physical stature of the students. The teacher would then begin giving extracurricular subject assignment to the students for the day. The physically capable one on the right would accompany the teacher to his kheti. The middle crowd would fetch firewood and stack it near the teacher’s kitchen. The left group with lesser capability fetches water from the village well and fills up the empty drum in the teacher’s house. That’s rural education for you! ... filled with high priority extracurricular subjects. Such is the educational scenario of our rural feeder schools for the Govt. MES and Govt. High Schools.
While I should hope the circumstance would have changed for the better over the years, the general level of commitment among the teachers across the board is still wanting barring few exceptions. Communitization of Education is a progressive reform that must be appreciated. However instilling a sense of responsibility in these Committees is an exercise still not seriously undertaken for a stricter disciplined management. It has been my oft repeated view that whatever be the compulsions, politicians must abstain from rampant appointment of unqualified teachers in the schools as a political job adjustment. Appoint the party men/ supporters in any other jobs but not in the teaching stream. Just look at many of the politically appointed teachers who sub-contract the post to others with or without appropriate academic qualification to teach in the rural schools on their behalf and share the monthly salary at a percentage. The Education Management Committees see such a mal practice yet do nothing to rectify such defaults in order not to displease the political class, or the influential GB or for one reason or the other. They still do not seem to understand that by allowing such a practice to prevail, they expose their own children to an academic disadvantage for life. With their indifference, the Government has still not been able to completely root out the problems of bogus teachers as well. It is a general factual assumption that a student would never be intellectually better placed than the teacher. What needs sensitive understanding is that an unqualified teacher, once appointed, would work for 30 years at least. Therefore, within this period of 30 years service, they would have directly been responsible for nurturing generation after generation of ill prepared students like their unqualified selves. This is the root cause of all the half baked citizens being manufactured from such institutions year after year, manned by half baked teachers who focus only on their monthly salary without real quality output. The generational damage being perpetuated is irreparable. The lack of qualities necessarily becomes the hallmark character of a people as these generations grow into maturity. Since the majority of the poorer section of the rural population can ill afford better private institution for their children, they ultimately form the bulk in the admission intake percentage into the Government High schools. To start with, the ill equipped background of such students is in itself a massive academic disadvantage for any institution, requiring special personal attention. Instead of understanding this reality, we compound the problems further by manning the Govt. schools with unqualified, uncommitted and indifferent teachers saddled with understaffing as well. It’s no wonder that the HSLC result of the Govt. Schools has been dismal. It provides us with a clear indication that the rural feeder schools and the MES have to be improved first. Government High schools cannot be expected to perform miracles overnight with unschooled children from the rural base. Be this as it may, it does not in any way exonerate the teaching faculty of the Govt. High Schools who show no sense of commitment either. Good results will never be forthcoming as long as we field uncommitted sub-standard teachers, Head Masters and English teachers who can hardly speak a sentence correctly? How can we expect our children to do well in science and maths without qualified teachers in these fields? Yet there is no focused attention being paid to priorities the shortfall.
I still remember a Government High School Head Master in one of my outpost assignment, trying to formally introduce me to his teaching colleagues during my visit to his school. He began with “My dear coligoose…” (meaning colleagues)…the rest was history. This High School produced nil result that year and equally dismal low percentage performance thereafter. The Government is attempting to produce Einsteins in Nagaland with donkeys in harness. Good luck to them and hard luck for us all.
