llliteracy: The plague of North India

    It is a well know fact that India has the most number of illiterate people in the world with a literacy rate of  around 74%. Another perhaps little known fact is that  more than 50% of India's illiterates are concentrated in North Indian states. My intention here is not to tarnish north India but rather point out some consequences and reasons for this based on some observations I made during my experience.

 Let me start with what prompted me to write this piece in the first  place. Recently  I got on a cycle rickshaw (a simple vehicle that moves on the pure muscle power of the driver) to go to a friends house. I asked the the driver (a man in his late 30's) to look for a sign with so and so name and number. However to this he replied meekly that he was illiterate and could not read. This came as a shocker and at the same time answered several questions. I have always wondered why anybody would become a cycle rickshaw puller in Delhi since it is probably the worst job a man can get in the transportation industry. Imagine cycling in the midday heat, amidst fumes and dust with  2 or 3 people attached to a carriage behind you. And the worst part is you only get paid a pittance, often less than what other taxi drivers make for the same distance. I have heard that most of these people contract asthma or some other lung disease

   My point in explaining the plight of the rickshaw drivers is that, illiteracy might be one of the driving factors that constrain them to take up such employment in turn be exploited by the literate people like us. There is an old saying in Kerala, "the one who was struck by the lighting was in turn bitten by the snake". I feel the plight of the illiterate rickshaw drivers and so many other illiterates mirror this statement. I do not think it would be farfetched to say that we the literates, have created a class of illiterates to exploit economically. Perhaps we did this unintentionally but certainly not without our knowledge.

 

 But why is it that despite so many years of independence,so many thousands of crores spent every year by the government for education, and the hundreds of NGO's who work for literacy that India is still many decades away from full literacy.

   Perhaps the reason can be found in the mindsets of the educated, North Indians themselves. I have often noticed a strong reluctance to share information to others, even if they are colleagues or coworkers. They seem to think that they posses a treasure which only they have the right to enjoy. If this is  the attitude of the educated towards their peers, how much more worse will it be towards the underprivileged.   Education is the methodical imparting of knowledge to those who don't have it, but that in itself would be a dead end if the educated does not share it with somebody else who don't have it.

Another interesting fact I have seen among certain lower middle classes is the limited importance they give for educating their children. Educating children is still secondary to marrying them off, or conducting some expensive religious ritual. Most often it's the girls who suffer because the limited family budget for education gets over with the boys. This is in direct contrast to south Indian families.

 The schools of course don't really help either. I have heard first hand accounts of government schools in rural areas where teachers only come twice every term even though the children come for the free food. Apparently all the children are given free passes to the succeeding years without writing exams. The other extreme are the private schools in the Cities, which have turned primary education into a money spinning corporate enterprise. Indeed the cost of a single term for a single student in one of these schools is enough to pay for a 100 or so students in a normal school. These schools cultivate a sense of cut throat competition from day one in the child for them to be successful. But in turn take away many things that could have caused them to care about the less privileged.

   I believe the eminent educationalists and political class of north India have to wake up to plague that eats the less fortunate in their backyard rather than slumber in their high mansions of national glory. No nation can claim any trophy in cultural greatness or set a date for economic might when a good multitude of its people don't know how to read or write. Similarly the educated in North India have to realize that without sharing knowledge, their education means nothing.

The illusion of Delhi

  When I had first imagined Delhi, its poverty was not something I had given much thought to. However over the year I have been in Delhi and North India, I feel it is the the most neglected subject by those like me who are better off. Whether in casual conversations or in formal meetings, it is either considered as a taboo or as a joke. But in the very end the fact remains that a chain is only as strong as it's weakest link.

 But when you peel away the glitz and glamor of Delhi's malls and clubs, or the stately prowess of its land marks, all you get is the sordid reality of its poor people living in urban squalor. I can only imagine the misery they endure day in and day out when I watch them from afar as they try to scratch out a living. The one's who pay most dearly are the children who have been denied everything you & I got as a child. The lucky ones have some parents to speak of while the unlucky ones have no one but themselves as they beg and work in the street just for survival. I fear we have much to answer for before God, for these little girls and boys.

 Unfortunately even my feelings for them have now gone numb after the many months I have seen this injustice play out before me and my realization that there is nothing I can do for them. Now I only hope to leave this city at the first opportunity with a promise that I do what I can to stop this urban abomination from taking root in my state and my city.

  However from a practical point of view, I cannot help but point out certain factors which I think contributed to create this appalling level of poverty and which will continue to be the cause of Delhi's demise. The city is built nearly in the middle of the great northern plains and shares boundary with states. Administratively & politically it seems a wise decision, except that most cities don't sustain themselves efficiently on that. They grow & sustain because of having access to geographical features facilitating trade & commerce, natural resources like water or a  year round pleasant climate that in turn fosters capital generating economic activity. Think of all other Indian metros which are on the coasts or other great cities around the world. 

   What features or resources does Delhi have other than becoming a dust bowl in summer and cold snapped in winter. It neither has a port or a navigable body of water (discounting the garbage canal that river Yamuna has become) nor even a source of drinking water. It doesn't even have any strategic military advantages. In short my opinion is that Delhi is an artificially propped up city that tries in vain to ape the other cities which generate capital using its considerable political power. In doing that it has failed to recognize the human tragedy unfolding within its walls. I can only hope the administrators and citizens of Delhi will come out of their illusion of greatness and do an introspection before Delhi suffers the fate of other vain cities that have come and disappeared in history.