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| A pre-verdict student adda on ‘Bleak Bengal’ at Flurys on Park Street. Picture by Rashbehari Das |
Date: May 9, 2011
Place: Flurys on Park Street
Occasion: An adda on ‘Bleak Bengal’.
The students: Esha Mookerjee (Bhawanipur Gujarati Education Society College), Kanika Issar (La Martiniere for Girls), Karan Kumar (Jain College), Lagnojita Chatterjee (Asutosh College), Pradipta Mandal (Jadavpur University), Roshni Ali (St. Xavier’s College), Shrestha Saha (Presidency University) and Sneha Paul (NSHM College).[Chandreyee Chatterjee and Samhita of Metro steered the chat]
O FOR OPPORTUNITY
Roshni: I want to leave the city for my post-graduate studies because there are very few options here in my career of choice (journalism). There is just a handful of media houses; beyond them, nothing. I am also interested in film-making, but I want to make meaningful cinema. Here films are either too aantel or crass, no middle path. Mumbai, Delhi or even London would be better for either career option because there I would have more job opportunities. The work culture in those places is also different. People here are too lazy, I think. It annoys me. Here you need to make an appointment at 11.30am if you want to meet someone at noon. Only then will they be on time!
Kanika: Calcutta had everything that Mumbai had. Both cities were very important in the British era and have an inherent culture. But Calcutta lost out because of lethargy and the lack of infrastructure. There is no growth in this city, unlike in Mumbai or Delhi. So, anyone with the zeal to do something is opting out. Little things like cleanliness and road safety are totally absent in Calcutta.
Lagnojita: I love this city. It is home to me, and I would rather not leave. But I am studying psychology and it is really frustrating that all our reference books are at least 30 years old. So much is happening in my field, but if I stay in Calcutta, my options are restricted to teaching or working in the human resource sector. Otherwise, I have to take up a profession completely removed from the subject I am studying.
Kanika: I want to study psychology too and the options abroad are so vast. That’s one of the reasons why I’m going to the US for graduation.
Lagnojita: There is this field called cognitive science — a mixture of psychology, math computer modelling etc. It is new to India but at least it is available in places like Allahabad University. But Calcutta University, supposed to be the best for psychology, does not offer it.
Roshni: One of my friends wanted to study sports psychology, which is really interesting and has huge scope now, but she is studying English in Loreto College because no college here offered that.
Sneha: I wanted to leave right after school but my mother didn’t let me. Most of my friends have gone to Pune, Delhi and Mumbai to study courses that are available here too, but they opted to leave because the facilities in those colleges are so much better. The course structure is up-to-date and the books are more recent.
Shrestha: I will be forced out of the city simply because I want more options for masters. I find it ridiculous that in most Calcutta colleges, if you want to study economics you have to take up math. Subject combinations are very limited here.
Esha: The mindset of people in Calcutta is so stereotypical. If you are studying humanities, people think it’s because you have failed to get into the science stream!
Kanika: I think Calcutta is losing a lot of students to international colleges primarily because they give you two years to decide what subject you want to major in and there are no fixed options. You can opt for anything.
Pradipta: My reason for wanting to leave Calcutta is the ridiculously low stipend a student receives during MPhil and PhD here.
Karan: Forget all that. I am being forced to consider leaving the city because the course that I want to take up — event management — is not even offered here! My parents don’t understand why I want to do that or what I will get out of it either.
Shrestha: That is another thing. Anything out-of-the box must be bad. Tourism management, event management — these are upcoming courses but no, it is new, so it must not be pursued! Another thing that I would like to mention about the education system in Calcutta is the lack of interaction between teachers and students. I mean, at the graduation level, you need to interact with teachers on a one-on-one basis. It happens in colleges outside the city. We just have teachers walking in and giving notes.
Roshni: Colleges here couldn’t be bothered I think. If you are applying to colleges abroad they send you brochures, give you the contact numbers of people who will guide you. Nothing like this happens here.
Lagnojita: The website of our college stopped functioning a few days after admissions got over!
Kanika: Colleges here are not interested in the holistic development of students. They just fix a cut-off and then select on the basis of that. They hardly bother to find out what else one can do.
WORK & CULTURE! WHAT’S THAT?
Lagnojita: Here I think I would also like to point out that there is hardly any opportunity to work while you study. I wanted to do a project in line with what I am studying but I didn’t even know where to start or who to approach.
Shrestha: My friend in Ramjas College in Delhi was telling me that they have guides to help students land an internship. There is no such system here.
Kanika: People looking for internship don’t even think about getting one in Calcutta. For one, companies here don’t want to take on interns and even if you do get one there are other problems like the work culture; no work gets done between 2pm and 5pm! A friend of mine who has finished his studies in the US has come back but his father won’t even let him look for work here. Calcutta has become a place where people come back to retire, like an old-age home. It is perfect for older people but there is nothing here for us.
Roshni: I do street theatre and I can tell how different the culture in places outside Calcutta is. Young people there are far more involved in what they are watching and others are doing. There is a lot of unity among the youth. Here people just want to boo and jeer.
Lagnojita: The problem is every other city has used its culture to grow but Calcutta has just sat on it.
does anybody care?
Kanika: That’s true, even when it comes to architecture. I went to Mumbai on holiday and saw that they have beautiful old buildings there too but they are so well maintained. In Calcutta, there are some old buildings with really great architecture but they are lying derelict. People here just don’t care… I also think we need to have some young faces in politics, to provide some dynamism and new ideas.
Shrestha: I don’t know about that. We have two active parties in college and my first whiff of college politics was this whole mess about someone being drunk, someone complaining and someone beating someone up. I mean it was so pointless. There was a barricade in front of our college and people had to scale the wall to get to their departments. Classes were disrupted, students were misbehaving with teachers. Is this our culture?
Kanika: I want to say something about the Metro. We were the first city to get a Metro but we have not maintained it at all. We have not expanded or modified it.
Roshni: None of the big stars come to perform here, be it Enrique or Metallica.
Sneha: Ha! Most Hollywood films release here a month or two after the other cities.
Kanika: Yes, all the big stars go to Bangalore and Hyderabad. Calcutta has one Someplace Else and it has been there for years and there is nothing else. Even if there is a show, people who have the spending power will not buy tickets; they will all try to get free passes, so all the sponsored stalls are full and everything else is empty. Why would young people want to stay here? For recreation in Calcutta one can only go out to eat or to the movies. The parks cannot be used because they are filthy. There is no public place where young people can hang out.
Roshni: I have competed in swimming at the state level and I can tell you that the condition of our government pools — like Padmapukur or Rabindra Sarovar — is pathetic. The water is green and there are tadpoles and snails in it. The pools are better even in Lucknow, where I had gone to compete.
Karan: The Salt Lake stadium was supposed to be world-class. I went to play football there and tripped on a hole dug for erecting bamboo right on the ground.
Shrestha: I was in Delhi last year when the Metro construction was going on. I was so impressed to see that they were clearing the rubble immediately after finishing work on a portion, so that the roads were free. Have you seen the condition of Karunamoyee?
Kanika: It boils down to the attitude of the people here. They are so lax.
Pradipta: Well, I was “male” according to my voter ID and it took me a year of running around to get it changed to “female”!
Kanika: We should do something about the driving schools too. It seems you don’t have to drive to get your licence! I shudder to think that this is where our taxi drivers get their licences.
Roshni: The corporation put some fancy-looking bins in front of our school (La Martiniere for Girls). But none of them had a base. So what you threw in just landed on the road. What is the point?
Kanika: Then there is our “international” airport. If you come in on an international flight, you realise that unlike Delhi or Mumbai, Calcutta has no decent duty-free zone, the conveyor belts are in a shambles, the trolleys don’t work, the terminal is dirty and littered. It’s embarrassing.
