Is This Education?

Ram was a government official who worked in education upliftment programs of central government. In reference to that once he was sent on transfer to a village in order to make those people aware about value of being educated. To his surprise, he found that no-one was interested in studies in that village. For 6 days he tried to convince villagers by showing them innovative experiments but whenever he motivated them to study they used to move away from him. Once when Ram was motivating people to study & everyone fled, an oldman standing at a distance with stick in his hand, started laughing loudly. His name was Suraj Lal.

Ram felt irritated. With an angry mood he went near the old man and said, "I am sorry to ask Sir, but is this a joke? Since last 3 days I am motivating people to study, you are laughing. You are just an old man but not a role model for this village. Old people are philosophers to tell moral values to young generation. But look at you, motivating people in wrong direction. If the attitude of elders is like that, what can we expect from young people. You are the reason why this village is not progressing." 

Suraj Lal was angry. Very angrily he came near Ram & said, "On what cost you want us to study?". Ram looked surprisingly. Suraj Lal took him to a house in the village. There was a lady sitting on the entrance of the main door, crying. Ram said, "Sir who is this & why she is crying." Suraj Lal said, "She is the mother of a boy who lived in our village. He belongs to this village. This lady utilised all her money, savings, jewelery & many household goods to give higher education to his son, who is now working in an MNC in big city." Ram asked, "Ok, but why she is upset. Is her son fine?" Suraj Lal said, "Of course he is fine, earning huge money in city. One day he took his mother with him to city saying that he will give her a good life. But reaching there he made this lady the maid of his house. He made his own mother the maid of his house. She used to clean his house, clean his used utensils, wash his clothes & that useless boy always treated her like a servant & never like a mother. He used to rebuke her every day.

One day when he was out to office, this lady ran away from his house & came back to the village. We all were crying when she told us her story. I remember how she has raised his son to be a reputed MNC Employee today. That man wanted higher education, his mother sold all her jewelry for that. That man wanted motercycle, this lady sold household goods for that. That man wanted to concentrate on his Career, this lady never involved him in village issues as it will break his concentration. She was very happy when he got settled with a good job & house is the city. To celebrate it, this lady prepared dinner for all villager & gave a grand party at her house. 

One day her useless son came to the village & said to her, "Mom, you have faced many hardships in life. Now I will give you a comfortable life." He took her mom to city. But reaching there his behaviour changed. 

He started treating his own mother as servant of house. He made her work as servant, her own mother. Sometimes he never even gave food to her. 

And this was all because of higher education he got, he became so advanced that his own people became servants for him. No sahab, we don't want to study anything. We don't want to be educated. Education took away morality, values & character of that boy. Please forgive us. We don't need education, we don't need education."  

Saying these words, that man started crying. He bowed his hands in front of Ram & went back. Ram looked towards the old lady, sitting quite, lost in her own thoughts, tears coming out her eyes constantly. Ram bent down, touched her feet to take blessings & said, "Amma, I will be back after few hours. I have some official work." Saying these words Ram moved towards his home. All the way he was crying. Non stop tears were coming out of his eyes. 

He said to himself, "Today I understood that being educated is not the symbol of being reputed. Without morality, education cannot make you a reputed person. 

We talk about education & growth all the time. But is this Education. Who is educated? Who is educated?" 

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