Education is the transmission of knowledge, skills, and character traits and manifests in various forms. Formal education occurs within a structured institutional framework, such as public schools, following a curriculum. Education is both the act of teaching knowledge to others and the act of receiving knowledge from someone else. Education also refers to the knowledge received through schooling or instruction and to the institution of teaching as a whole.
Recently President Ranil Wickremesinghe emphasised the peril of politicising education, warning that such a move would inevitably lead to the nation’s downfall. He urged all stakeholders to set aside personal biases and engage in collaborative discussions to devise the most effective education system for the country.
Last week, Higher Education State Minister Suren Raghavan stated that ragging in State universities has been reduced by around 85 percent now due to increasing punishments for ragging and raising awareness. The Higher Education Ministry has decided to name next month (May) as `the Month of Kindness’ with an anti-ragging programme. This programme will be implemented to further reduce ragging.
Ragging needs to be eradicated forever from the Sri Lankan education system especially from State educational institutions because it is raggers who play football with the country’s education. The toughest possible punishments need to be given for raggers and the country’s common law needs to be strictly implemented against raggers. Victims need to be protected from raggers after making formal complaints and all possible steps need to be taken to protect the victims who come forward and make formal complaints.
The patterns and objectives of ragging in various State educational institutions are totally different from one another. Ragging in some State schools takes place purely due to jealousy and bullying. Ragging in all the other State higher educational institutions except State universities is driven by revenge and jealousy. The ragging that takes places at all State universities is done in order to produce `protestors’ for various types of protests that are being organised by one students’ union belonging to two small political parties.
Earlier they were one and later this minor political party was divided into two factions. Now one of them has three percent representation while the other does not have any representation at all. They hijacked the so-called `Aragalaya’ and destroyed valuable properties belonging to the state and private individuals.
In State universities, the very first objective of ragging is taking revenge and the second objective is turning all undergraduates against any Government and any leader ruling the country at any given time. The undergraduates are brainwashed and turned into protestors. Some “heroism” is injected in them during this brainwashing. After undergoing this brainwashing, they start to believe that becoming a protestor is a heroic act. If Sri Lanka can completely get rid of ragging from all State universities, there will not be any protests which block Colombo’s roads once every week putting tourists and all others in various difficulties. Unfortunately, no decision-maker has seen the direct connection between ragging and protests.
We can forget about this issue if it ends in State universities. But it does not. These raggers become strikers as soon as they are employed as public servants in various State institutions. This is why we see various strikes at State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) almost every week. When raggers become public servants, they scare and intimidate all the other employees and drag them into various strikes and protests. They even physically harm those who oppose or do not participate in various trade union actions.
This is how the entire education sector faces various delays from time to time due to strikes launched by school teachers and administrators. It is the precious lives of children which get wasted. Schoolchildren watch while school teachers play football with education.
It is high time the Government leaders and especially the decision makers notice the extremely strong connection between ragging, protests and strikes. The main mechanism and foundation of producing protestors and strikers is ragging. If Sri Lank wishes to move forward, ragging needs to be completely eliminated from the universities and other seats of learning.
The Sri Lankan education sector needs a National Policy that never changes with the change of Governments, leaders and especially Education Ministers. Various officials should stop playing football with education in Sri Lanka. There should be a valid reason for any change they make. The country has witnessed a decline of social norms and all other morals. Rapid social destruction is evident.
The responsibility for this situation goes to the education sector. The education system of the country should produce law-abiding citizens. Today, unfortunately, no law-abiding citizens can be found. The problem is with the education system and not with the Police. By now the entire country has forgotten that there was an era when schoolchildren were brought out of schools and made to light firecrackers by a small political party three decades ago. Unfortunately, they are still playing football with the country’s education. They are again seeking the people’s vote in a more democratic guise, but a leopard never changes its spots. No room should be allowed for them to ruin children’s education in the future.
