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The tiny and remote state of Mizoram, having a literacy rate of 93 per cent, second only to Kerala, can now flaunt yet another record in the education scenario. Its colleges have the country’s lowest teacher-student ratio. The state, which has a population of 8.5 lakh, boasts of a total of 31 colleges.
While the total number of students is pegged at 6,445, the number of teachers is stated to be 770. When the teacher-student ratio is calculated, the figure is a mind-boggling 1:8.37 — the lowest in the country. In some colleges tucked away in remote areas in the state, such figures are astonishingly even lower than the state average in this regard.
Believe it or not, NE College at Khawdungsei has 13 lecturers on its rolls who teach only 19 students. Zawlmuam College has 16 teachers who teach a flock of only 33 students in the whole campus.
The highest number of students enrolled in a college in Mizoram is in Hrangbana College in Aizawl — 1,230 students. A pool of 41 teachers belonging to the Humanities and Commerce streams kindle the light of higher studies in them.
A senior bureaucrat in the Mizoram government justifies the setting up of so many colleges in the underdeveloped state by pointing out to the keenness among the Mizo students to obtain the benefits of higher education.
Going by the “hopes” expressed by jazz exponents Pam Crain and Donald Saigal, who were in Shillong recently for the first jazz concert in the city, jazz music is poised to return to the picturesque hill station. Jazz was popular in Shillong in the early Seventies, but the notes unfortunately faded away with the advent of the peppier pop, rock and other styles of Western music.
After the enthusiastic response to the latest “Shillong experiment”, the musicians’ hopes might not be misplaced.
A few names from Shillong had once made it big on the national jazz scene — the late Eddie Rynjah, Toto Wahlang and Little Richard.
Drawing inspiration, many music students are now exploring ways to enter the jazz world. Soon, a jazz yatra could roll out from the Scotland of the East.
The 20-year-old Arundhati Singha is a young woman with a mission. The second tribal girl from the Northeast to have been selected to undergo Bharatanatyam training at the famous Kalakshetra in Chennai, Arundhati’s burning desire now is to bring about “peace in the region through dance and culture”.
She is concentrating on finishing her diploma at the Kalakshetra, but “dreams” of teaching Indian classical dance and music in the Northeast, thereby “exchanging traditions for strengthening bonds”.
The young danseuse knows it will be a “difficult task”, but believes “it is not impossible”. She has already created a fan-following, especially among the youth, many of whom have already hitched their wagons to the “dream mission” of the petite dancer.
Bihu, the soul of Assamese culture, is now a part of the English language. The latest edition of the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary has included the word.
Bihu is the second Assamese word to find a place of pride in the dictionary, after kala azar.
The latest edition of the dictionary has, as a matter of fact, included around 400 new words gleaned from different Indian languages on various topics, including the colloquial dishum dishum, benami, bak bak, fhaltu, yaar and so on.
The dictionary, edited by Angus Stephenson and William Tumble, has once again proved that English is indeed a global language.
Jorhat is bustling with a rare kind of energy nowadays.
One or other kind of public show is always there to infuse some life into the moribund existence of the denizens.
After the “expo” organised by the Y’s Men’s Club, there is a mega musical evening lined up for December 7, featuring Bollywood names like Shaan and Mahalaxmi and Jorhat’s own Zubeen Garg at the stadium ground.
The organisers have put up posters, gates and banners aplenty along most of the town’s roads and streets, announcing the event.
The district administration and police, too, have contributed their mite in ensuring that nothing goes wrong. Jorhat seems destined to have loads of fun, next only to Guwahati.
One of the most popular children’s stories in Assamese, Budhiyok Kauri aru Koloh (The Intelligent Crow and the Pitcher), from the legendary Lakshminath Bezboruah’s Buri Air Sadhu, is now set to hit the screen in animation form.
The brainchild of cartoonist Pradeep Nath and graphic designer Jayanta Bora, the animation film has been made to bring alive the popular tale on screen for the new generation, who are getting increasingly addicted to moving images.
For those who have seen the eight-minute animation, the results are impressive enough for more such stories to be thus filmed.
In order to reach out to a wider audience, the film will also be dubbed in Hindi and beamed on Doordarshan.
Where there is a will, there is a way. Hynniewta, an official of the Police Radio Organisation in Meghalaya, has proved this adage true. In Cherrapunjee or Sohra, the water-scarce “wettest place on Earth”, this government official has succeeded where the authorities concerned had failed — in ensuring water supply.
Frustrated at the water scarcity and government inaction, Hynniewta — six months into his posting at Sohra — decided to do something. He found out a good spring source, of which there are plenty on the plateau, and constructed a miniature check dam, one metre in length and height, to regulate water supply. Realising that things could be further improved by constructing a small concrete tank, the innovator got into the task with alacrity by collecting funds from the local people. After office hours, he would turn into a mason. Within a month a tank was ready for use. Now, the tank, which is connected through pipes from check dams, always remains filled. A small step by Hynniewta has been a big one for Sohra.
