Thoughts

As the title of this post indicates, these are just random amalgamations of some late night thoughts of being a student in today. For anybody following the news, this week has made headlines of all sorts coupled with social media marred with misinformation, disinformation, claims, counterclaims, factual reports and just opinions everywhere. The echo chamber for sure has been created as the algorithm rewards us by showing content which reaffirms our belief on what we choose to believe. Before going into the details, I would like to give a disclaimer that I'm not associated with any political movement and these are purely some thoughts from a student.

Indian education system is one of the most rigorous ones in the world and our entrance examinations constantly feature in the list of some of the hardest exams to exist. Well, given the populace, they serve as a filtration strategy but does it reward all. I had appeared for JEE mains in April 2024 after finishing high school as I wanted to study engineering. Needless to say, yours truly didn't have a very high percentile in a standardized test as there are people like me who perform better for descriptive exams and projects. However, engineering admissions in India aren't dependent on a single examination as private universities have their own entrances and therefore, a person not going to an IIT can still pursue engineering by going to private universities ranked in par with IITs. What makes decentralization possible is that there exists no discrepancy in the free structure between a government institute and a private one.

Now, given this background let me come to the matter of the current issue regarding our medical entrance exam for undergraduate medical degree. I had taken biology along with physics, chemistry and math in my final two years of schooling though I had no interests in medicine and I had seen the way my friends studied to clear the entrance exam. Unfortunately, in 2024 the exam was marred with controversies and people had to attempt again. The question paper was unprecedented and hardest in 2025 and there was a leak in 2026 followed by a retest. Therefore, some in my friend circle gave up on medicine and are pursuing degrees in AI while some gave their third attempt this year. One among them committed suicide as the familial pressure coupled with financial burden was unbearable for her. From what I gathered, there was a lot of misinformation about the retest this year such as the retest paper being leaked which led to her untimely death. Another reason is the familial pressure as its high time Indian or in general Asian families accept that engineering, medicine and law aren't the only successful professions out there.

Pursuing these without passion and spending hefty amounts (equivalent to fees of an undergrad degree) on coaching to clear entrance exams coupled with interfering societal pressure takes a toll on one's mental health with the added burden of the uncertainty on the exam being leaked or being postponed. Well, here comes the question just as engineering, private medical colleges exist so people can study medicine in a private institute instead of a government college but the discrepancy in fees is tremendous and medical aspirants from middle class backgrounds can't afford private medical education. Its a murky domain and I'm grateful that I had resisted every bit when my father wanted me to be a doctor and not an engineer as medicine isn't even my passion and I find machines more interesting. Furthermore, I should say, I've faced less pressure from my parents as they have allowed me to choose my domain and not forced me to get excessively high scores in an entrance by attempting it multiple times.

During a dinner time discussion on this current fiasco, my dad was talking about his attempts with the AMI exam which had to write to get his mechanical engineering degree in the early 90s. He had qualified in his first attempt but received a score card which said he had flunked a couple of subjects and had to register for a re-exam six months after that. He did register for it only to find a few days before the re-exam that his registration was cancelled as he had already qualified it and hadn't flunked anything and his revised score card would be sent by post. It wasted six months of his life. So academic corruption is not just today's storage but an age old tale but does that mean we shouldn't demand accountability today? It should change at some point of time shouldn't it? This was just his bachelor's degree. His PhD was worse as his supervisor at IIT Roorkee tortured him which led to two years of wastage of his life and he was only given bare minimum respect when he went to complete a part of research in Technical University of Berlin in 2000. That experience has given him permanent PTSD at this point. His profession started an up-turn when two British professors liked his work and he built his early career in Canada and Netherlands followed by Singapore and then came back to India. His academic success here is only considered as he had foreign affiliations earlier so does this mean that to be taken seriously, we have to be foreign certified as only that earns respect?

So academic corruption in India is not just limited to exams being leaked but in the entire education eco-system. I can understand this further as both my parents are in academia. So, it is understandable that students would be frustrated but news over the past week has been more narratives than information fueled by noise over social media without any fact checking. Back in May, the Cockroach Janata Party came into existence. I found the satire interesting at first but saw that people from increasingly questionable backgrounds joined the movement and therefore, I chose not to follow it. Then, with the latest protest, we had politicians who themselves are extremely corrupt joining the movement and it is very obvious that they don't care about students. The anger exists as its not just about medical exams anymore but even about our board exams. I had written board exams in 2022 and 2024 and until last year the papers were evaluated manually which led to a fair evaluation at the national level as it written by millions of students to finish their schooling. This year, on screen marking was used which involved scanning of these millions of papers and uploading them to a repository and digitally evaluating it. Well, answer sheets were swapped and pages with scribbles were considered unwritten by the LLM. As much as we complained about our physics paper being the hardest in 2024, I would have flunked with this system of evaluation as I clearly remember my answer sheet being scribbled as I consider it impossible to have a neat physics answer sheet with proper derivations. Therefore, the anger and agitation make sense but what doesn't is the haphazardness and the noise.

There was supposed to be a march to the parliament on the 20th of July. The organizers of the march hadn't obtained permits and the people who proclaimed themselves as safeguarding students were nowhere to be found when the march began. It led to a stampede as a huge chunk of the protesting students were trapped between two barricades and were beaten up by the police forces who ironically didn't have their badges on them. Meanwhile, what raises questions is why were stones in a truck kept near the protest site and why were broken cars next to it? On the other hand, as with every other protest in India, some people without knowing the context just join in for the sake of vandalism and started beating up police officers and damaging public property. Given the scale of Indian population, even if 10% of the crowd goes unruly, it becomes a mob. What makes this worse is that while on one side we had students with intelligent slogans and posters, there were politicians making demands for Article 370 in Kashmir which is unrelated to education? Whilst there was hunger strike by Sonam Wangchuk, some leaders of the CJP movement just were eating in the background. The utter mismanagement and chaos which unfolded on Monday just shows that nobody cares about the students. Students who were peaceful were manhandled on one hand while violence followed by anti-social elements.

On one hand students were beaten while on the other vandals haven't been identified. The myriad of demands at a protest which was supposed to be for education and peaceful is just stark. There were protests in the northeastern city of Aizawl in Mizoram and it was so different from Delhi. It was peaceful as it was intended to be, there was no vandalism and the demand was for educational reforms and resignation of the education minister. Its perhaps a lesson to be noted as protests are necessary in a functional democracy and dissent does not make one an anti-national as we only question things because we care about things. Amidst this chaos and mismanagement, so many hundreds of innocent students got hurt as people hijacked a movement for their own political gains. There was violence against the police force on Wednesday night as some unidentified people just came into the protest who weren't even students but what makes it even worse is the way narratives are formed. The violence on Wednesday was used an excuse to discredit the entire movement while downplaying the people being beaten up on Monday.

The part most horrifying about this is the narrative war associated with it. Over the past few days, I looked into videos from both sides to not fall into an echo chamber and what saddened me is the lack of verification of information before sharing it. There are two sides to the story and perhaps only PeekTv actually gave a balanced report by showing both the aspects of vandalism. When it comes to sensitive issues such as a protest in a national capital which drew separatist movements targeting the nation's sovereignty, it is pertinent to check facts before sharing anything on social media. A stark example of this is the students being accused of damaging India's first hydrogen train in anger which wasn't the case at all and in reality railway ministry debunked it as a case of vandalism from Bihar reported two years ago. Likewise, there are narratives sympathizing with the police while branding students as terrorists and vice versa with each side not looking into opposing view. People fall into these narrative wars and I personally know people endorsing the CJP and even some extremely questionable people who target India's territorial integrity as a rage bait against the government. I know government supporters who are not willing to look at the other side of the issue as well. The narrative polarization is tremendous and being a centrist is the hardest today.

Democracy is built on demanding accountability from the government and that doesn't mean we hate our nation. A government in a democracy is built by the people and for the people so as a responsible citizen we are supposed appreciate the positive parts of a government while criticizing things which have gone wrong and led to utter chaos and mayhem such as the current scenario. Does that mean that I would blindly support anybody without fact-checking their background? No absolutely not as some people who said they were concerned have some very filthy and murky track records themselves. Furthermore, does this mean that does anybody care about the students, perhaps not really which is proven by the government's indifference for so many days and finally a statement from the prime minister yesterday and also by the sheer political motivation of people using the issue while implicating students. Does the opposition care as they claim to? It was their government and paper leaks happened back then. Perhaps they were scrutinized less due to a controlled information sphere and the absence of social media back in the day.

Hundreds of thousands of students had gathered for the protest to demand accountability peacefully and both the government and the CJP are accountable for the violence which unfolded. Moreover, it is possible to support democracy and free speech while questioning the mob violence as maintaining law and order is necessary in a city of 30 million people. If peaceful protests were possible in Aizawl, if they happened in Kolkata, a city of roughly 15 million people in August 2024 due to a murder of doctor, then they are possible, provided people genuinely join it not just for namesake.

As I end this string of thought, I want to delve into what I had learned about a democracy back in 10th grade in 2021 that constructive criticism helps a nation grow. Questioning the government is not anti-national and there are issues about which we mustn't remain passive but that does not mean rage baiting to prove a point. A balanced viewpoint can be formed where the frustration of students is taken into account while condemning police brutality, vandalism by mob elements, indifference of the government (hypocrisy as the education minister had once protested a paper leak in 1997), the current opposition who had been in power earlier (education system was corrupt back then as well) and the credibility of the protest leaders who were nowhere to be found on Monday. What we require rather is the ability to verify information and think critically before jumping to any conclusion about any issue and confining ourselves to an echo chamber and shutting ourselves off from the opposing view. Democracy is about dialogue and a democracy is truly successful only if people with different viewpoints deliberate together instead of just reaffirming their belief systems based on algorithmic and dopamine rewards.