Students as stakeholders

With reference to the article, ‘Unemployable engineers: Who’s to blame?’ by Rajkamal Rao (November 2), the entire onus for the unemployability of students has been put on the faculty members, which is far from the truth The quality and attitude of students are equally to blame. A majority of the students fail to clear and obtain their degrees in the first attempt. The criteria for admission to engineering colleges have been drastically reduced and many are compelled by parents to pursue these courses. There is a total disconnect between industry and academia.

It’s also a misconception that positions in corporates remains vacant for want of qualified engineers. The corporates are primarily looking for skilled employees from ITIs and polytechnics, and refrain from recruiting full-fledged graduates as this would be a costly affair. There is an oversupply of engineers. The exams are designed to test memory and not cognitive, creative or critical skills. Students remain mum in class for fear of being laughed at. We must encourage students to question the status quo and not accept what their teachers say as the gospel truth. The ball has always been in the students’ court and will remain there.

AE Charles

Coimbatore

Politicisation is not the only reason for non-performance. The demand for technical degree colleges soared in India because technical apprenticeship is not popular; apprentice pay structure and training are archaic. Moreover, the higher education system does not give preference to apprentices, apart from the standard and quality of apprenticeship being under scrutiny. Whereas in Germany, they have a well integrated apprenticeship programme that has created employment opportunities and reduced the pressure on degree colleges.

India’s policymakers were not well prepared to respond to the demographic challenge. Post liberalisation, the demographic explosion created a huge demand for education; the government responded by recklessly allowing private colleges and deemed universities to operate. There was no emphasis on quality. India cannot progress with such a low skill system. It is important to focus on quality higher education under the skill India programme and address the issue at the systemic level.

Naveen Agrawal

Puducherry

It is nether the first time nor the last that such a sad article has been written about the capability of our engineers. It’s a mindset. Unlike in the West, where education is more job- or career-oriented, we prefer getting degrees. We must have better career-oriented courses, and more industry interaction and participation with the UGC to design courses in such a way that they meets industry requirements.

Bal Govind

Noida, Uttar Pradesh

Agents of change

The editorial, ‘Driving demand’ (November 2), rightly reflects the slowdown in economy and company strategy to combat the crisis by decreasing costs. We can learn from successful corporates. For instance, LIC derives most of its revenues through his agents.

The agent model can be implemented in manufacturing by equipping people with tech knowhow and allowing them to produce in the factory for their clients. This will get rid of fixed costs such as salary and excess capacity, and give people an opportunity to earn more.

Vikram Sundaramurthy

Chennai

FB blues

Mark Zuckerberg’s address at IIT Delhi must have been very inspiring. Though social media, especially Facebook, is an inseparable part of our lives, studies have shown that it has become an addiction. FB can be stressful to users who fear missing important social information or offending people, of who feel guilty rejecting friend requests or deleting unwanted contacts or feel bad on being unfriended or blocked. It can also make people feel envious as they see the posts, photos and videos of their friends vacationing or compare the number of likes or birthday greeting with their friends.

TS Karthik

Chennai

Highlight everything

With reference to ‘Reading the quarterly numbers’ by Nalinakanthi V (November 2), it may be worthwhile to standardise the matters that are highlighted along with the quarterly numbers. We see each company highlight the parameters that are favourable to them, ignoring the key and adverse figures and ratios.

For instance, when it comes to banks’ quarterly results, some highlight NPAs if they have improved, some highlight business growth when it has gone up significantly, some ignore the return on assets if it is below the past result, profit slippage is sidelined when it exists. Hence, instead of being elective of only data that is favourable, SEBI should mandate the banks and companies to come out with standard parameters to be highlighted, irrespective of its result status, whether positive or negative.

RS Raghavan

Bengaluru

Traffic woes

There are always traffic jams in the metros. One cause is faulty planning and actions by residents’ welfare associations in shutting security gates in and around colonies, lack of discipline in movement of vehicles, closure of u-turns and right turns in more places than needed, resulting in travelling so much extra. The planning of flyovers are also faulty. Security checks and barricades even during rush hour compound matters. Most irritating is VIP movement of cars.

M Kumar

New Delhi

Learn from nature

This refers to ‘The greening of India Inc’ by A Didar Singh (November 2). We can learn a lot from nature. A Canadian company has designed wind turbine blades mimicking the design of whale tails and has proven a 30 per cent increase in the power produced from these turbines. It’s been proven that organic agriculture can act positively towards carbon sequestration. They are also mimicking coral reefs to convert carbon dioxide to concrete. We need to incentivise bio mimicking innovations to achieve our promised emissions reduction targets in the long run.

CR Arun

Email

Distorted question

The question in Today’s Poll — Raghuram Rajan wants an end to vigilante acts. Do you agree? — is a distortion of what he said. According to The Hindu, he merely said, “…vigilante acts will affect growth”. The question should have been better phrased.

J Viswanathan

Chennai

Get to work

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s remarks that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been the “worst victim” of this type of “ideological intolerance” since 2002, should have few takers. The finance minister has also not redeemed himself by lashing out at the Congress, Left thinkers and activists. His remarks show that he is there to do the Prime Minister’s bidding. It is time the BJP stopped taking a dig at others and got down to the serious task of administration.

NJ Ravi Chander

Bengaluru

Bihar election

People as well as politicians are attaching great importance to the hotly contested Bihar election, mainly for the possible impact it will have on national politics. The result will reveal whether the BJP’s victory in the Lok Sabha election was a transient phenomenon or a durable shift of India’s population to the Hindu right. With four phases already over, the Grand Alliance is said to have more than an even chance of emerging victorious. If indeed that happens, it is sure to be viewed as a measure of the decreasing popularity of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The BJP, already in the firing line over the ‘increasing intolerance’, will become even more vulnerable to attacks from the Opposition and the ‘intellectual class’ and get defensive.

Bihar’s lower orders seem to have tilted in favour of the Grand Alliance with RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat’s ill-timed and game-changing call for a review of the caste-based reservation policy introduced to redress centuries of inequality. Even Modi’s innuendo about giving away 5 per cent reservation to a ‘particular community’ could not break the impregnable vote block of OBCs, Dalits and Muslims. But it lowered the exalted office he holds.

Lalu Prasad Yadav’s rule has given courage and dignity to the affected sections to stand up for themselves and social justice, and erase Hindu-Muslim riots from the state. The less advantaged in today’s Bihar care as deeply about social dignity as development. In Nitish Kumar they have a leader who represents both.

G David Milton

Maruthancode, Tamil Nadu

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