What's Kashmir got to do with placements and exams?
S. Mitra Kalita -
Friday, August 22, 2008 11:03 AM
A lot, actually. While my column today focused not on issues related to workplace or education, two professors I interviewed for the piece (but didn't end up quoting) were downright sorrowful over what the recent violence and curfews have meant for higher education. At the University of Jammu, classes were supposed to start up again in early July and in early August in the case of the business school. That, obviously, hasn't happened. The regular routine for families in Jammu has become to run out and go shopping in the morning--and then stay cooped up inside. Students' lives are on hold, as they wonder if they should just give up on the year and seek admission elsewhere.
"It's been a big disaster. We were just starting our academic session. July is gone. August is done," said
Professor Ashok Aima, a business policy professor at the University of Jammu's business school. "Our children have to compete at the national level, they won't understand why they can't."
The director of the school, Keshav Sharma, said the irony is that Jammu has not had to contend with much of spillover from the ongoing Kashmir comflicts as "Jammu has always stood with India."
Indian companies, are you listening? How about reaching out to the universities in Jammu & Kashmir and offering to absorb a few candidates during special placement sessions? The same could go for admissions in postgraduate programmes. While we're at it, let's extend the offer and exemptions to the innocent victims of bandhs in states like Kerala, West Bengal, Assam, Mizoram, etc. Wait, that's a lot of youths with lives on hold. So would it just be easier to exempt schools and colleges from militants' wrath during such demonstrations? Of course, that might actually lead to some economic development, which often doesn't seem the goal of said militants... Go ahead, make my day and react. As Sri Sri Ravi Shankar himself said last week, "Dialogue is the only way to resolve the present crisis."