A small village
Panapakkam, 88 kilometres from Chennai is in news for wrong reasons and .. has
raised lot of debate in social media. Headmistress
Ramamani and teacher Meenakshi Sundareswari have been suspended and how do you
view this ?
History teaches
lots of things .. .. read of Battle(s) of Panipat. The Third Battle of Panipat took place on 14
January 1761 at Panipat, about 60 miles (97 km) north of Delhi, between a
northern expeditionary force of the Maratha Empire and invading forces of the
King of Afghanistan, Ahmad Shah Abdali, supported by two Indian allies—the
Rohilla Afghans of the Doab, and Shuja-ud-Daula, the Nawab of Awadh.
Militarily, the battle pitted the artillery and cavalry of the Marathas against
the heavy cavalry and mounted artillery (zamburak and jezail) of the Afghans
and Rohillas. The battle is considered
one of the largest and most eventful fought in the 18th century.
Centuries after the
war, some analysts point out that it was not only the geography, logistics,
changing times, attitude, getting more alienated, military acumen and strategy,
facing new type of ammunition and armoury – all contributed to the defeat of
Maratha Empire, which perhaps failed to read from its victories over a longer
period of time. Wars are cruel and are acid test of the economic, social,
technological and moral strength of a nation. The momentous war of Panipat was
to have its everlasting impression on the future of the Nation. The battle of
Panipat was a turning point in the history of not only Marathas but whole of
India. A British historian writing about this battle has opined that but for
this defeat' whole of India would have been 'Marathaised'. Panipat was the
first major battle that Marathas fought with reliance on artillery and
fire-arms based infantry. The Marathas
fought at Panipat for a national cause. Their failure to defend India left a
deep psychological impact on them.
No commentary
on history – but pure fact that there will be failures and one should learn to
cope up with failures rather than giving up.
And many a times with the social media, print and visual media, failures
are handled differently, sometimes failures are glorified while sometimes,
people are driven to despair and to failure !
At International
Court of Justice there was to be great drama.
Slobodan Praljak was one of six former Bosnian Croat political and
military leaders up before the court. He was sentenced to 20 years'
imprisonment in 2013 for crimes in the city of Mostar. On hearing that his
sentence had been upheld, he told the judge, "I have taken poison". The
six were appearing in court for the final appeals judgment to be handed down by
the Yugoslav Tribunal.
One-time allies
against the Bosnian Serbs, Bosnian Croats and Muslims fought each other during
the civil war from 1993-94, with Mostar seeing some of the fiercest fighting.
Praljak stood and raised his hand to his mouth, tipped his head back and
appeared to swallow a glass of liquid. Presiding judge Carmel Agius immediately
suspended the proceedings and an ambulance was called. "Okay," the
judge said. "We suspend the... We suspend... Please, the curtains. Don't
take away the glass that he used when he drank something." Before the
curtains were lowered, the courtroom could be seen in a state of confusion, the
BBC reports from The Hague.
Back home, inn
Tamil nadu, the death of 4 students has anguished people. Four school students
reportedly committed suicide by jumping into a well near Avalur on Friday
afternoon. According to police, the students – all aged 16 years and studying
in class XI at a government school in Panapakkam – jumped into a well in
Ramapuram in Avalur. They were identified as Manisha, Sankari, Deepa and
Revathi, all residents of Panapakkam.
Preliminary inquiry
revealed that their teacher had asked them to bring their parents to school as
they did not do well in academics. “It looks like they took the extreme step
out of fear,” a police officer said. The incident came to light after residents
of the locality grew suspicious on finding two bicycles used by the students,
their bags containing books and footwear near the well. The police were
informed at 4 p.m.
Now that
the Headmaster and the class teacher
have been suspended –they would for sure face lot of hardship and turmoil. But merely reading the various reports, does
it not appear that the Teacher and HM did only what was expected of them. It appears that they did not publicly shame
the girl students but only asked that the parents of those girls be present in
the school. Is that anything wrong ? –
should teachers be questioned for everything.
No other opinion that death of students is sad – irreparable loss for
the students. But over the years, education and the hostile attitude to
teachers have put them under fear all
the time. Already there are talks that
not many now a days come forward to teaching profession – and if teachers
undergo mental pressure, what will happen in future ?
3 or
4 decades ago, teaching profession was most respected. The teachers had every
right to cane, hit and punish the students.
Parents would always support the teachers, requesting them to be strict
and mend their children. Things have
changed for worse !!
The deaths
of the girl students is sad and cruel - a step in addressing this should in making
them and all the students understand that one should not despair at failure and
should face difficulties and failures in life.
Failure could be a reality in life and at some level understanding and
embracing such failures would help one to grow.
History for sure would reveal that great men had experienced colossal
failures but got up in time to face the next round !
One can hate failure, but if it strikes, without
allowing to dictate the future, should curtail emotions and seek to face the
consequences. People should be taught to
separate failure from one’s identity. As they say, it it not the person who has
failed but one particular plot that has failed.
Rather than getting angry, frustrated, emotional, blameful, vengeful,
one should try to understand the reasons and seek to overcome it. From Thomas Alwa Edison to modern day
inventors, all have experienced failure and humility repeatedly but rose up to
become to be remembered as inventors rather than those who failed at simple
steps. In a society, most of us look to
the approval stamp of others without realising that they had not courted
success. Michael Jordan said it best:
"I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300
games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot, and
I missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is
why I succeed."
It is
time we taught the kids that failures are part of life and one should face it
with courage and not punish those teachers and others blaming them to be
responsible for the failure.
With regards – S.
Sampathkumar
29th
Nov. 2017.
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