Class eight student Babloo is one of the top students in the government secondary school in Gopiganj. But although he has been studying English for the past two years, he cant even recite the alphabet. Half my class cant speak, read or write in English, he says in defence. I ask him how he passes his exams. We dont need to pass any test to get promoted to the next class. All we have to do is pay Rs 25-30 as pass-karai fees. Babloos case is not an isolated one "" in his class of about 35 children, barely 25 per cent pass the final examinations.
Education in secondary schools in the smaller districts is often so poor that students emerge from school without learning their three Rs. One fall-out of this is that it raises their aspiration level without equipping them for any vocation. After passing high school, most students do not like to do menial jobs, but dont have the skills needed for better jobs. An exporter friend says that he once interviewed no less than 20 graduates (one was actually teaching commerce in a college) for the post of accountant "" and found that none could divide 1.2 by 6.
Without the promise of a decent job, secondary education is not an attractive proposition for most villagers. Many feel its a waste of time, or as Chameli Devi of Parbatpur puts it, a place where you send your children to ensure they do not get up to mischief. Many believe these schools are for the idle rich. Says Nirmala Devi, a tea shop owner in Gopepur, Sending your children to school is a luxury which we cant afford. When her husband died seven years ago, she found herself with no option but to send her eldest son to work. But she does not regret her decision. School is good only up to a point. But too much education makes boys expect too much from life. Thousands of boys complete school, how many get decent jobs? she argues. She is not alone in her disdain for secondary education. Chameli Devi beamed with maternal pride the day her 16-year-old son Pappu declared that he was dropping out of school to become an auto-mechanic. It is a good steady job. And it is not as if completing high school would
guarantee him a better one, she reasons. Her other son, she feels, is a bit of a wastrel "" in class ten, he enjoys science and maths and has applied to a computer training institute.
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Not surprisingly, school drop-out rates are quite high. In primary school, most children leave school after class five . This is also the age at which many girls are taken out of school, as many families do not let their daughters go out of the house after they are twelve or so. Babloos school, one of the biggest in Gopiganj, offers only up to class eight, after which children go to a school in Gyanpur, a neighbouring district. This is where more chidden drop out, either because they do not qualify for admission into class nine, or because they cant go all the way to Gyanpur. Also, picking up skills in auto mechanics or carpet weaving seems far more practical than going to a distant school for an education that cannot be put to gainful use.
Thanks to strident anti-child labour activists, most villagers are aware that they can be jailed for employing children. But the activists are often very unpopular, and have been lynched while raiding carpet looms using child labour. Says an angry mother, whose 12-year-old son is the sole earning member, Who is the government to make rules about our children? Tell them to give my husband a job, and Ill send my son to school instead of the carpet loom.