India is well known as a peace loving country. India’s contribution towards world peace and harmony is inevitable. Right from the early ages till the 21st century, India has always stayed out of war and violence, except for a few instances. Till date the country stands for peace and harmony.
The Indian mythology is entirely based on peace and monstrous creatures trying to disrupt peace. Thus, the good was born to terminate the evil and restore peace. Epics such as Ramayana and Mahabharata give us a clear picture of the cities in those days. There existed love and sympathy for all living creatures. Peace was spread all over and people were happy.
In the early ages, saints and sages such as Buddha, Mahavir, Shankaracharya and many more have preached the message of truth. They taught us to love and live harmoniously with all the living creatures. Their teachings were entirely based on peaceful co – existence. They were the advocators of peace and harmony.
In the later years, figures like Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi stood for peace and non-violence. His teachings on non-violence and non-violent methods of agitation was internationally acclaimed and practiced by eminent personalities like Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela who followed his footsteps and fought for independence. Throughout his life and even after that his teachings and messages convey to us the message of world peace and brotherhood. No wonder he was called Mahatma! His disciples and followers such as Jawaharlal Nehru had once mentioned in his speech – “children are the buds of our country that will blossom into fragrant, bright and colorful flowers in the future”. His love towards children was extraordinary and thus, on the account of his birthday, children’s day is celebrated nationwide. Throughout his life, he too conveyed the message of peace, harmony and truth.
Talking of peace, we must not forget Mother Teresa and Baba Amte who have worked all their life for the poor and destitute. Mother Teresa had formed an organization known as Missionaries of Charities whose objective is to help the poor and destitute and provide them with food and shelter. She received the nobel peace prize in the year 1979 for her contribution towards world peace. Baba Amte, who is yet another eminent personality, worked his entire life for the prevention and rehabilitation of people suffering from leprosy. His work was credited and appreciated by the Human Rights Commission as he received the Human Rights Award in 1988 in addition to the Magsaysay Award in 1985.
India has contributed towards world peace by sending peacekeeping forces and troops under the U.N.O to several places in the world. Some of them have failed but a majority of them were successful and a few of them are still in operation in a few places of Africa.
India is also one of the Third World Countries. It is an active member of the Non-Alignment movement. It had also signed the Non-Proliferation treaty which stated that India will never support or accept nuclear warfare. But to prove it’s strength in nuclear matters India also conducted the Pokhran tests in 1998 and proved itself to be a peace loving but strong and mighty nation.
Pakistan, the neighboring country of India, has always been in a status of war with India since the messy partition of 1947. After years of war, it was India which took the initiative and extended it’s hand for friendship, brotherhood, peace and harmony. This shows India’s want for peace and harmony.
But in spite of India’s tremendous contribution to world peace, violence and disharmony is still evident in many parts of the globe. In my opinion, the world needs more Gandhis and films like Lage Raho Munnabhai which has popularized Mahatma Gandhi’s message of truth and peace as ‘GANDHIGIRI’ to the entire nation. Lets all inculcate the very spirit of peace and brotherhood and heal the world and make it a better place to live for the generations to come.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
Reality Shows - Falling Media Standards
In this modern, hardworking, competitive urban lifestyle, where every second counts, people are competing with time to make a proper livelihood.
After a hard day’s toil a person comes back home, sits back in his sofa, takes the TV remote in his hand and switches on the television in order to get amusement, entertainment, information and knowledge.
But nowadays, we see all the entertainment channels telecasting reality shows. Even news channels speak about the various reality shows. What exactly is a reality show? They are programs which provide a platform to the common people to showcase their talents in various spheres such as dance, music, humor, acting, adventurous sports and games, etc. who otherwise would not have gained recognition for their talent. In other words, it turns a zero into a hero! It glorifies a common man’s journey.
These programs provide exclusive entertainment to people of all age groups, starting from eight to eighties. Several dance and music reality shows have made attempts on bringing back the long lost culture of the 1950’s 60’s 70’ and 80’s into the 21st century and most of the have been successful in doing so. Also, many of these shows have made people recognize their hidden talents and have motivated and inspired them to participate and bring out their talents.
Reality shows focusing on adventurous sports and games such as fear factor has helped people to overcome their fear psychosis and phobias.
But, just as every coin has two sides, reality shows too have a positive as well as a negative aspect. In fact, the negative aspect is more than the positive one. Each and every reality show that is telecast is being sponsored by big corporate houses and telecom industries. Even a weather report on a news channel is being sponsored by some or the other company. Thus, the entire entertainment arena has been largely commercialized and through these reality shows, the industries have made huge profits.
Most of the reality shows don’t even maintain the minimum standards. In this process of commercialization, the standards of these programs have been falling. In several programs, there are uses of extreme abusive language which are censored by ‘BEEPS’!!! But ironically, the more number of ‘BEEPS’ a show has, the more will be it’s TRP rating and the younger generations especially are more attracted to such shows. As a result, the younger generations are getting exposed to many things inappropriate of their age.
Nowadays, there are separate reality shows for children alone. The participants in these shows are forced to stop their studies and as a result they waste one whole academic year. Apart from this, a lot of politics and corruption takes place in these reality shows. They are taught how to get fame easily and quickly.
Reality shows have taken yellow journalism to a new height. The more controversies in a program, the more TRP it gets. The more the controversies a participant has, the more famous he becomes. Sometimes, the entire controversy appears to be just a got up game. Most such shows are entirely dependent on the voting process of people. This way, people get carried away by their emotions and send innumerable SMS votes and thus lose or better waste their money and the telecom industries make huge profits. Also, the younger generation gets addicted to such shows and sit glued in front of the television. Sadly enough, the limelight and attention which the winners of such shows get is momentary. After a while, they are forgotten by everyone and it becomes tough for them to sustain.
It is really sad that a country like India having rich culture, heritage and a very prosperous past, is getting lost in this mad race to become a developed nation. Well, becoming developed does not mean copying the west, America is still very proud about it’s history whereas India, in spite of having a way prosperous history and heritage is going in the wrong direction and madly trying to become western. The Indian history needs to be glorified and this can be effectively done by the help of the entertainment world which should do away with these reality shows and should focus on the Indian heritage.
After a hard day’s toil a person comes back home, sits back in his sofa, takes the TV remote in his hand and switches on the television in order to get amusement, entertainment, information and knowledge.
But nowadays, we see all the entertainment channels telecasting reality shows. Even news channels speak about the various reality shows. What exactly is a reality show? They are programs which provide a platform to the common people to showcase their talents in various spheres such as dance, music, humor, acting, adventurous sports and games, etc. who otherwise would not have gained recognition for their talent. In other words, it turns a zero into a hero! It glorifies a common man’s journey.
These programs provide exclusive entertainment to people of all age groups, starting from eight to eighties. Several dance and music reality shows have made attempts on bringing back the long lost culture of the 1950’s 60’s 70’ and 80’s into the 21st century and most of the have been successful in doing so. Also, many of these shows have made people recognize their hidden talents and have motivated and inspired them to participate and bring out their talents.
Reality shows focusing on adventurous sports and games such as fear factor has helped people to overcome their fear psychosis and phobias.
But, just as every coin has two sides, reality shows too have a positive as well as a negative aspect. In fact, the negative aspect is more than the positive one. Each and every reality show that is telecast is being sponsored by big corporate houses and telecom industries. Even a weather report on a news channel is being sponsored by some or the other company. Thus, the entire entertainment arena has been largely commercialized and through these reality shows, the industries have made huge profits.
Most of the reality shows don’t even maintain the minimum standards. In this process of commercialization, the standards of these programs have been falling. In several programs, there are uses of extreme abusive language which are censored by ‘BEEPS’!!! But ironically, the more number of ‘BEEPS’ a show has, the more will be it’s TRP rating and the younger generations especially are more attracted to such shows. As a result, the younger generations are getting exposed to many things inappropriate of their age.
Nowadays, there are separate reality shows for children alone. The participants in these shows are forced to stop their studies and as a result they waste one whole academic year. Apart from this, a lot of politics and corruption takes place in these reality shows. They are taught how to get fame easily and quickly.
Reality shows have taken yellow journalism to a new height. The more controversies in a program, the more TRP it gets. The more the controversies a participant has, the more famous he becomes. Sometimes, the entire controversy appears to be just a got up game. Most such shows are entirely dependent on the voting process of people. This way, people get carried away by their emotions and send innumerable SMS votes and thus lose or better waste their money and the telecom industries make huge profits. Also, the younger generation gets addicted to such shows and sit glued in front of the television. Sadly enough, the limelight and attention which the winners of such shows get is momentary. After a while, they are forgotten by everyone and it becomes tough for them to sustain.
It is really sad that a country like India having rich culture, heritage and a very prosperous past, is getting lost in this mad race to become a developed nation. Well, becoming developed does not mean copying the west, America is still very proud about it’s history whereas India, in spite of having a way prosperous history and heritage is going in the wrong direction and madly trying to become western. The Indian history needs to be glorified and this can be effectively done by the help of the entertainment world which should do away with these reality shows and should focus on the Indian heritage.
Friday, September 18, 2009
The Importance Of Board Examinations
From the prehistoric era, the Charle’s Darwin theory states “THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTNECE” and “THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST”. From this it is evident that over the ages the mankind exists based upon this theory .In any sphere of life, we have to prove ourselves by demonstrating our individual skills.
Education, as defined by Swami Vivekananda, is the manifestation of the perfection already in man. One of the fundamental goals of education is to impart culture across the generations. Education is not always the education that a person receives in school. The process of education starts as soon as a baby is born and stays life long.
Each and every person faces some or the other hurdle to become successful. Without facing hurdles and challenges success would not have any meaning. Likewise, the board exams act as an initiation for the students and it prepares them for the competitive and challenging world that lies outside their school campus.
Our education system has been designed in such a way that students undergo the board exams twice – once in tenth and once in twelfth. Once the students undergo the tenth board exams they get a glimpse of what the board exams are like and later when they appear for the 12th boards, their pressure and stress is much reduced. Hence the pressure of the students is very well balanced due to the two board exams held.
Board exams are a benchmark for assessing a child’s educational standards. Board exams help students to battle out the most difficult of all exams and tackle tense situations with ease. Education upto the tenth standard is considered to be the basic education which a child receives. Even though he/she is interested in non academic fields such as performing arts or sports, etc. the basic knowledge that they receive uptill 10th makes them aware of their surroundings. The education pattern Is such that it develops the personality of the child so that later on he/she can express their views and ideas regarding any general topic. it prevents them from being ignorant of their own society. The system is absolutely well designed and apt for the all round development of a person. Even a very famous sportsman will know something about history of his country and geography of the world. And that applies to people in all fields.
The boards help in acquainting the students with the little pressure so that they are used to handling pressure and don’t fell bothered about it later in their life.
Besides, evaluation by the school teachers is more of the subjective type whereas evaluation done in the board exams is more of the objective type and hence it results in a better assessment of the student.
Very recently, our human resource development minister Mr. Kapil Sibal, has announced to scrap tenth standard board exams completely. This decision will have serious repercussions as when the students reach the 12th standard, they would suddenly have to face the boards which increase the stress and this adversely affects the career and future of the students. It would definitely not act as a stress buster for the students. Life is full of stress. One can’t just scrap all the stress that comes one’s way. Scraping of 10th Board Exams won't lead to any improvement in the quality of education, instead it will lead only to deterioration because the students will lose the motivation and incentive to study. Scrapping of tenth boards will lead to more no. of non governmental/private institutions coming up offering board exams preparation courses and in course leading to the deterioration of the school level of education. Also, if the boards are scrapped the judgment of student will be depending entirely upon the school. This will lead to improper judgment of the students and will greatly affect the uniformity of the results nation wide. The standardization will be a complete mess.
Nowadays people from all over the world prefer studying in Indian institutions as they feel that Indian pattern of education is probably the best in the world. Thus, the Indian education system is such well designed and planned that Barack obama has asked US students to study like the Indian kids and catch up with them, whereas our Human resource development minister is trying the reverse. If your hand gets injured, you treat it with care and apply medicines and sprays … but you don’t just chop off your hand!!
The board exams makes students look at the harder side of life. They kearn to be more practical and rational in life. They realize that the world outside their campus is not like the one inside their campus. It also inculcates the competitive spirit within the students that is necessary to face the competitive world outside. It gives the students the courage to face the challenges of tomorrow.
Most of the students who write the tenth board exams are just around 15 – 16 years olds. They are in their teenage which is the most unstable stage in a person’s life. Hence, the tenth boards help these teenagers to grow into adults. Thus, the boards in the teenage acts as the gateway to the adulthood of a child.
The concept of the board examinations is marvelous, but, in the present scenario it’s implementation is very much improper. The board exam report cards have 2 to 3 pages giving the academic assessment of a student whereas his co-curricular activities and non academic skills are cramped in to one page. The CBSE must provide more provisions in the subjects such as performing arts, sports, etc. so that a student’s all round development is evaluated and these subjects should have equal importance like maths or science.The recipe is good but the salt is less!!!
Education, as defined by Swami Vivekananda, is the manifestation of the perfection already in man. One of the fundamental goals of education is to impart culture across the generations. Education is not always the education that a person receives in school. The process of education starts as soon as a baby is born and stays life long.
Each and every person faces some or the other hurdle to become successful. Without facing hurdles and challenges success would not have any meaning. Likewise, the board exams act as an initiation for the students and it prepares them for the competitive and challenging world that lies outside their school campus.
Our education system has been designed in such a way that students undergo the board exams twice – once in tenth and once in twelfth. Once the students undergo the tenth board exams they get a glimpse of what the board exams are like and later when they appear for the 12th boards, their pressure and stress is much reduced. Hence the pressure of the students is very well balanced due to the two board exams held.
Board exams are a benchmark for assessing a child’s educational standards. Board exams help students to battle out the most difficult of all exams and tackle tense situations with ease. Education upto the tenth standard is considered to be the basic education which a child receives. Even though he/she is interested in non academic fields such as performing arts or sports, etc. the basic knowledge that they receive uptill 10th makes them aware of their surroundings. The education pattern Is such that it develops the personality of the child so that later on he/she can express their views and ideas regarding any general topic. it prevents them from being ignorant of their own society. The system is absolutely well designed and apt for the all round development of a person. Even a very famous sportsman will know something about history of his country and geography of the world. And that applies to people in all fields.
The boards help in acquainting the students with the little pressure so that they are used to handling pressure and don’t fell bothered about it later in their life.
Besides, evaluation by the school teachers is more of the subjective type whereas evaluation done in the board exams is more of the objective type and hence it results in a better assessment of the student.
Very recently, our human resource development minister Mr. Kapil Sibal, has announced to scrap tenth standard board exams completely. This decision will have serious repercussions as when the students reach the 12th standard, they would suddenly have to face the boards which increase the stress and this adversely affects the career and future of the students. It would definitely not act as a stress buster for the students. Life is full of stress. One can’t just scrap all the stress that comes one’s way. Scraping of 10th Board Exams won't lead to any improvement in the quality of education, instead it will lead only to deterioration because the students will lose the motivation and incentive to study. Scrapping of tenth boards will lead to more no. of non governmental/private institutions coming up offering board exams preparation courses and in course leading to the deterioration of the school level of education. Also, if the boards are scrapped the judgment of student will be depending entirely upon the school. This will lead to improper judgment of the students and will greatly affect the uniformity of the results nation wide. The standardization will be a complete mess.
Nowadays people from all over the world prefer studying in Indian institutions as they feel that Indian pattern of education is probably the best in the world. Thus, the Indian education system is such well designed and planned that Barack obama has asked US students to study like the Indian kids and catch up with them, whereas our Human resource development minister is trying the reverse. If your hand gets injured, you treat it with care and apply medicines and sprays … but you don’t just chop off your hand!!
The board exams makes students look at the harder side of life. They kearn to be more practical and rational in life. They realize that the world outside their campus is not like the one inside their campus. It also inculcates the competitive spirit within the students that is necessary to face the competitive world outside. It gives the students the courage to face the challenges of tomorrow.
Most of the students who write the tenth board exams are just around 15 – 16 years olds. They are in their teenage which is the most unstable stage in a person’s life. Hence, the tenth boards help these teenagers to grow into adults. Thus, the boards in the teenage acts as the gateway to the adulthood of a child.
The concept of the board examinations is marvelous, but, in the present scenario it’s implementation is very much improper. The board exam report cards have 2 to 3 pages giving the academic assessment of a student whereas his co-curricular activities and non academic skills are cramped in to one page. The CBSE must provide more provisions in the subjects such as performing arts, sports, etc. so that a student’s all round development is evaluated and these subjects should have equal importance like maths or science.The recipe is good but the salt is less!!!
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