Pol Ke Bol!

In the 19th century, the British flooded China with one of the most potent and addictive drugs in the world. They even had two wars over it which the Chinese resoundingly lost. It ensured the slow destruction of Chinese society during their “century of humiliation” with a single product – Opium.

If the Chinese had Opium, India has Hopium. While the British Raj is very much to blame for a lot of issues facing India today, entrance exam mania is not one of them. Ever since I was a kid, my parents wanted me to excel in the myriad of entrance exams India offers. I could buy a Tinkle comic only if I went through the latest edition of ‘Competition Success Review’. Those dense, GK and current affairs rich monthly editions were incredible to read but for the small problem of me being 10 years old.

I don’t blame my parents for being obsessed with me succeeding in entrance exams like UPSC, JEE and CAT. Most middle-class families in India have no option but to push their children to the limit hoping they will take the family’s fortunes to the next level. Sound logic, if you are willing to ignore that most people are dumb and most kids are especially dumb.

People often find it difficult to accept that many Indian parents look at their children as a lottery ticket. Bang it on the head enough times, and it may open up a treasure chest. Sometimes it’s true and we see movies and shows being made out of these select few who crack entrance exams. Indians are addicted to stories of the underdog beating poverty to make it big in life more than a 5-year-old is to candy or Nirmala Sitharaman is to torturing the middle class.

Despite all the glitz and glamour of our airports and corporate parks in major cities, India is still an abysmally poor country. We keep pretending to be on the same track as China and are promised we’ll soon be experiencing a similar level of prosperity. Just any day now, we will see Shanghais and Guangzhous popping up every 100 kms in India. You just wait. It’s happening. Little more time. We are going to get it.

Wait what was that? Kids drowned in a basement while studying for India’s biggest entrance exam? Coaching centres are running classes in the dungeons of Delhi and Kota where kids keep killing themselves every alternate day? Come again? The parents are selling their land to send their kids to prepare for some of the toughest exams in the world? Coaching centres are spending millions of dollars in advertising on media houses that have zero incentive to stop the gravy train? Some of our civil servants being grotesquely wealthy and corrupt is actually a prime reason for the popularity of the UPSC?

Man, that’s a bummer. We are already late for Dr. Kalam’s super-power appointment that was ironically interrupted by something from China. What do we do!? There’s only one solution – Hopium. An all-powerful drug that makes you believe anything is possible. Especially the absurd and illogical. There are more craters on the road outside my house than there are on the moon but hey, we are a superpower okay. What is life if not a vehicle that runs on hope? The problem is, Indians are overdosing on Hopium.

We are no longer able to survive our reality and are fast escaping in a world that’s in the clouds. Not the AWS kind, but something much more polluted. I will not blame the UPSC for it is only an exam. I do believe its inability to offer anything other than civil service admission is wasting centuries of cumulative effort of our nation’s youth. But that can and will be changed soon. What can’t change soon is our overreliance on entrance exams to earn a decent and dignified living in India. Our MPs are asking people to take up plumbing and welding jobs and not run behind white-collar opportunities.

While that advice is logical and all professions must be respected, I will call this a failure of the BJP-led NDA to have not created enough jobs in the last decade. Our demographic dividend is on the highway to become a demographic nightmare. You can’t expect someone with a BCom or Bachelor of Arts to do welding. It goes against their parents’ expectations, societal conditioning and more importantly, their ambition. I won’t get into the caste angle when it comes to physical labour in India in this article. That’s a quagmire of its own.

It’s time India ditches hopium and sees the reality as it is. Not all of us can be IAS officers. Unless you have fake certificates. Then it’s a different story. On a serious note, let’s not blame coaching classes who are just sprouting uncontrollably only because most people have no work to do and believe wasting their 20s in faraway cities preparing for an exam is the best course of action. Let’s not blame movies and shows because they are just giving the people want, with a little bit of masala on top. And let’s definitely not stop dreaming of being a super power.

Hopium is bad. Pessimism is even worse. We have our problems and none of the solutions are short-term. Our generation is most likely going to see a much better version of India in the next two-three decades just like our parents did. They went from a nine year waiting period for Bajaj Chetaks to scores of scooters being sold on their mobile phone today. We too will witness a rising India. But it won’t happen unless we all accept that entrance exams are a rejection mechanism and not a selection mechanism.

We need a recalibration of what is the definition of work. The Government must use its formidable communications mastery to rebrand blue collar jobs. Rather a graduate fixing a car than throwing a Molotov cocktail. Entrance exam attempts must be reduced. Local level job creation combined with Universal Basic Income is the need of the hour. It will be expensive. But I have full faith in our Finance Minister’s ability to swipe my wallet. But it’s fine. Rather pay off potential societal upheaval than witness it in fear from my window. Our nation’s youth must be encouraged but also protected.