The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : `Education should balance rights, duties'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Mar 10, 2007
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Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

`Education should balance rights, duties'

Special Correspondent

Bangalore: The declining interest in pure sciences and arts and the mushrooming of technical educational institutions is an indicator of society's lopsided understanding of values in education, said Jnanpith Award-winning Kannada writer U.R. Ananthamurthy.

Delivering keynote address after inaugurating a seminar on "Human rights and values in education" at SSMRV College here on Friday, he said education should help an individual strike a balance between awareness of one's rights and a sense of obligation towards society. Mr. Ananthamurthy cited a report from The Hindu on dumping of carcasses of stray dogs on the outskirts of the city along with garbage as an instance of what happens when society abdicates all sense of obligation.

"We only indulge in knee jerk reactions without stopping to wonder how we have contributed to creating a situation where dogs turn ferocious," he said.

While Mahatma Gandhi awakened the sense of obligation in our society's psyche, Ambedkar created an awareness of their rights among oppressed sections, he said.

A balance between the two could be achieved only through a rounded education system that was not geared singularly towards equipping one to make money, but allowed one to "discover values inherent in oneself", he said.

Every individual had the right to discover his potential through education, and notions of social justice and quality could not be divorced from one another, said Mr. Ananthamurthy.

D.H. Lawrence, he said, came from an economically disadvantaged class.

He concluded his presentation with the caution that the aspiration of balancing rights and obligations would not fructify if there was no common schooling system where children of all classes and castes studied together.

"We now have a schooling system where the rich study with the rich and the poor with the poor without any possibility of interaction. The ideal of quality can only be achieved only through social justice," said Mr. Ananthamurthy.

M.K. Panduranga Shetty, trustee of the R.V. Educational Institutions; Sriram Bhat, head of the Sanskrit Department; and S.K. Jayanthi, principal of SSMRV College, were present.

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