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Indian School

Summer in the city, the temperature’s 40 degrees, and as always in India the heat is on. The fever brought about by exams is nothing that can be sated by any ordinary medicine. The only thing that works is success and that success is hard-earned. The pressure generated by the exams, and all that they represent for the future, cuts across everyone. Parents are driven, children are burdened, and life is surreal while the fever rages.

The teachers, in fact, are a calming influence and generally enable the students through encouragement and counselling.

Success means the opportunity of even harder work in a prestigious college, and a life full of promise tantalisingly close, like an apparition on the horizon. Fail and there’s the promise of oblivion in a second-class non-competitive education system.

The children, with a healthy dose of pragmatism, accept this is their fate and that for 10 years they’ve been preparing for this life-changing pivotal moment. In the UK there are also similar pressures, but it seems like there are no second chances in India and the attitude of 'better luck next time' doesn’t even enter the thinking.

Four thousand Indian children commit suicide every year due to education pressure. Is this a price that’s worth paying? Or does the fear of economic hardship justify this hyper intense approach, because ’survival of the fittest’ will ensure the survival of the country? What do you think?

Find out more:

• School Standards: time for debate?
• Why is schooling failing in the 'new' India?
• The Changing Face of the Teaching Profession

About the author

Billy Khokhar is an assistant director with the Open University, and an expert on cultural awareness and diversity. Billy used to be a teacher, and is interested in how education in India compares and contrasts with the UK.