In a recently held press conference over the row of the paper leak scandals of two entrance-level examinations NEET and NET, congress-leader Rahul Gandhi alleged that the RSS-led ideological ecosystem of the current BJP regime has destroyed the education system of the country and it now requires a complete overhauling. While many of the commentators and observers writing on the ongoing crisis have preferred to term it an act of grave mishandling on part of the government, Gandhi instead chose to attack the continuing hold of ideological machinery of RSS over India’s educational institutions and termed the present crisis a fallback of this hold.
He was soon reminded by the ruling party that he shouldn’t do politics on these paper leaks and speak responsibly in the public domain. The arrogance of BJP and its leaders, as always, was evident in these remarks. Over the years, the ruling party has seldom shown the decency of taking the criticism of opposition leaders healthily. On this occasion too, the party responded to Gandhi’s criticism with a righteousness attitude without realizing that there was a merit in several of the points he raised.
Why should Rahul Gandhi’s remarks be taken seriously in the context of the paper leaks incidents? The first and obvious reason is that we need to address these scandals as a political fallout of a process where higher education institutions and central universities in India have increasingly come under direct control of cultural wings of the ruling party, RSS and ABVP.
While it’s true that the field of education has never been free of ideological pressures and bias; every government in the past has worked in certain ways to fulfill their ideological goals and needs; but the integrity and credibility of higher education institutions and regulatory bodies have never been compromised so severely in post-independence history of India.
In an attempt of preparing its ideological groundwork for long-term ‘educational reforms’, Narendra Modi-led BJP government in last ten years has frequently appointed people of RSS background on key bureaucratic and educational positions and in the process has bypassed the prevailing rules and regulations at its will. Take, for example, the case of present NTA chairman Pradeep Kumar Joshi who is currently under fire for damaging the credibility of testing agency.
A recent media report has claimed that Joshi was a loyalist of RSS when he became the chairman of Madhya Pradesh Public Service Commission in the year 2006. The same report has also claimed that his appointment as the chairman of Chattisgarh Public Service Commission was also challenged later in the high court for bypassing the existing constitutional procedure. The manner in which he has been entrusted the responsibility of heading the probe panel to investigate the paper leaks also speaks a volume about his influence in the party and the organization and hypocrisy of BJP government. Here is person who has been given the task of probing the leaks which happened under his own chairmanship! Joshi, in this way, is a prototype case of how people sharing an ideological link with RSS are not only given critical positions in the power but are also rewarded for playing with the future of the young students and aspirants.
The paper leak scandals are also a shocking reminder of how entrance examinations of highest credibility have been increasingly jeopardized by the Narendra Modi-led BJP government. In a country where the access to quality higher education remains confined predominantly to an elite, upper caste section of the society, the transparent conductance of national level entrance examinations ensures a level-playing field for millions of marginalized students across the country.
Given the hold of a very intricate network and nexus of local mafias, coaching centers and elites over the state-level examinations and its system, many students invest their invaluable time and energy in the preparation of these national-level entrance exams, hoping that they would be conducted with utmost transparency and would thus provide them equal opportunity to compete with other students. The way in which regional-level agencies and selection commissions have mishandled the exams conducted for the state-services in recent past is already a story of shame.
According to a media report, the rampant malpractice of paper leaks at various levels has affected almost 1.7 crore aspirants across the country in last seven years. These leaks are not only restricted to major recruitment and higher education exams but also affect state-level and school-level recruitment which are rarely reported in mainstream media. The lack of accountability on part of selection commissions in the various states (Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan and Gujrat) led senior journalist Ravish Kumar to do a famous ‘naukri series’ six years ago on television where he documented the stories of struggle and pain of several students who were the victim of rotten system of recruitment boards in their respective states.
Why the stories impacting the future of students in lakhs and crores in these states remain unreported in mainstream media is a question one should ask in the wake of recent paper leak scandals. The answer to this discomforting question hints at a definite nexus that operate between media, local elites and politicians and exam mafias. The fact that many of these states where the paper leaks have been reported in huge numbers in recent years are BJP ruled states also deserves attention in this respect.
Apart from these larger issues, it is worth reiterating that Modi-led BJP government and NTA mishandled the entire incident at every level. Despite Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan announcing the constitution of a high-level committee to provide recommendations for enhancing the structure and security protocols of NTA, some tough questions still await answers from Education Ministry and agency. It is beyond understanding why the agency failed to track the leaked question papers before the conductance of UGC-NET exam on June 18, 2024.
The posts claiming the availability of UGC-NET ‘question Papers-June 2024’ were resurfacing on various social media platforms almost before a week of the scheduled date of the exam. Why did agency not take the cognizance of such claims? Was it not the responsibility of NTA to reassure aspirants about the credibility of the exam or was it simply unaware of such claims? If later was the case, then it raises a new set of questions with regard to its competency. An agency having a responsibility of conducting national level entrance examinations can’t afford to be so clueless about claims concerning integrity and credibility of exams.
In fact, the declaration of the cancellation of the exam just after its scheduled date gives an impression that NTA was very much aware of these claims of alleged leaks but it didn’t show the empathy for millions of aspirants who put their hard work in preparing for the exam and struggled to reach their centers amid intense heat waves. The reports of how aspirants fainted in their examinations hall facing shortage of drinking water and other facilities are already being documented in large numbers and serve a proof of the mismanagement with which exam was conducted across the country.
One of the reasons why Narendra Modi-led BJP government has failed to show any empathy toward aspirants and students and educational institutions is because it never respected the autonomy of these institutions and always eyed to compromise it for its ideological expansion and interest.
There is widespread belief in some circles that RSS has been given a free hand in the field of education and the sole purpose of the organization is to appoint and recruit its own people on key institutional positions even at the cost of compromising institutions hard-earned credibility. The continuing rage over paper leaks scandals should, therefore, be seen as a yet another proof of BJP’s grip and hold over India’s public institutions.