‘Education system reduced to extortion machine’ Rahul Gandhi calls for reforms

During an interaction with NEET aspirants, their parents and families here, Rahul Gandhi described India’s education system as a rejection, rather than selection, system that has been reduced to an extortion machine.

Speaking at the interactive dialogue held with coaching-seeking students here Wednesday night, the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Lok Sabha pointed out that 22 lakh NEET aspirants bear a burden of Rs 1.32 lakh crore every year, an amount almost equal to the total budget allocation of the entire Education Ministry.

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Likewise, he said, the cost of appearing for and preparing for the five top professional examinations – NEET, JEE, UPSC, SSC and RRB – paid by families of aspirants (Rs 3.5 lakh crore), is also equal to annual budget of five Ministries granted by the Union government, projecting the cost figures based on a briefing by the participating students.

This, coupled with poor prospects of success and tough competition for jobs, makes the aspirants most vulnerable to stress, which he said is unfair and brutal in nature.

“This is the core of the problem we assembled here to explore a solution to. We will talk purely apolitical and work out on the task together, Rahul Gandhi declared at the beginning of the programme, calling four students, who are preparing for different professional exams, up on the stage.

He spoke to the students about their target, duration for preparation, fees and other expenses and then built required data to further his narrative.

He said, “India’s education system is an extortion machine, it takes lakhs of rupees as expenses for examinations. For five top exams, lakhs of rupees have been taken from your pockets, promising employment in return. But how bright are the prospects you see. The reality of the job scenario is, when 1,000 aspirants enter the system (of competition), only 12 get a permanent salaried service.”

“In our programme, 3,000 aspirants have joined, from this group only 36 would get permanent employment,” he said, stressing the poor figures and higher expenses.

“300 of 1,000 would remain jobless and join the defunct, drug-addict, debt-ridden lot. Remaining 700 would be either, gig workers, porters or drivers with Uber, Ola or working in MNREGA. You are competing with the best in the country, and these are your odds, I think, this is a crime. I think, this is an insult to every single young person in this country,” he said.

In this context, he called the Indian education system a rejection system, not a selection system and went on to say, “I don’t mean to discourage you, because you should dream and I am pretty sure that you will succeed, but what I want to tell this country is that you are facing extremely difficult odds, that is why we had the tragedy that we had.”

He concluded by saying, “We need to change this the system of extortion and rejection, we have to reform it. The education system we want should allow every single Indian to dream big. It is task and responsibility of India’s education system to realise your dreams at the lowest cost without burdening much your pocket.”