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K.G. Kumar

LAST week, two happenings in Kochi sought to swing the spotlight on to certain striking aspects of Kerala that remain defining characteristics of the State, despite all these years of development, change, market forces and globalisation. The first related to the Ernakulam Public Library, one of the State's oldest public libraries and a cheap and comfortable refuge for Kochi's residents. Its functioning was disrupted for the second day on Friday when the 17-member staff resorted to strike in protest against the suspension of a Class IV employee.

The library secretary placed the security assistant under suspension for threatening him with physical assault while he was coming out of an executive committee meeting on Tuesday. The security assistant had allegedly used abusive language while raising the issue of wage revision.

The second event took place at the Government Girls Higher Secondary School in Kochi the day after Christmas. Several hundreds of young women who had congregated on the school from different parts of the State to take part in a study camp had to return home tired, sleepy, harassed and humiliated, after they realized that they had been taken for a ride by the organisers of a course in information communication technology (ICT).

The camp, organised by a Kadavanthra-based outfit calling itself the Information Technology Development Centre (ITDC), had promised to offer pre-primary teachers training in ICT. However, the programme, plunged into chaos soon after it began, as the organisers could not cope with the huge turnout of young hopefuls, many of whom had to spend the night in the unlocked classrooms and open courtyard of the school, in the company of mosquitoes, great discomfort and fear. With neither the infrastructure nor logistics in place, some of the organisers of the training programme tried to flee the scene, but they were accosted by the women and their families.

And for good reason. Each of the potential trainees had paid Rs 500 for the three-day camp, which was supposed to cover the costs of food and accommodation, apart from the course material and certificates. The trainees told a reporter from The Hindu that they were forced to come for the camp as the organisers had threatened not to issue certificates unless they participated in the camp.

Libraries, women, strikes, collective action - all cornerstones of the Kerala model of development and long held up as cherished symbols of an alternative path of progress and social empowerment.

To those, today you can add ICT, the new panacea for that old scourge, unemployment. The fact that hundreds of women from places like Neyyatinkara, Pala and Malappuram (ironically enough, said to be Kerala's most ICT-literate district) should rush to a Kochi suburban school for a training programme that sounded ill-focused, vague and plain exploitative in the first place, speaks volumes of the desperation to which Kerala's youth have sunk.

All the more pity since when upcountry ICT firms do try and recruit young graduates from Kerala, they often go away empty handed, since Kerala's boys and girls lack the all-important soft skills of communication, team interaction and leadership so necessary in today's competitive and globalised economy.

The sorry fact is that Kerala's youth remains unemployable for want of a well-rounded education. Not quite the cheerful note on which to end this season of cheer and goodwill, nor quite the siren call for an upbeat new year. But perhaps some good will emerge after all from a resolve to introspect.

The writer can be contacted at kg@tug.org.in

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