WHAT'S IN IT FOR ME?

India is going through very interesting times. Leaving aside our personal worries, beliefs and political preferences, we must recognise that we are part of an unprecedented, radical economic, social and political experiment. Thirty years from now some of us who are in their fifties might be discussing the "demonetisation of 2016" with a grandchild who is a serious student of economics or politics or social sciences.

Most of us will go through the motions, accepting our lot and changing unknowingly as forced by the evolving situation.

A lot of us will spend a lot of time on social media as Modi supporters or opponents.

Some of us will dispassionately look at the situation, analyse it logically using the information and data at hand. They will focus on two aspects
(1)Do I need to do something different to ensure that my path and trajectory remain  unchanged?  If the answer is YES, they will institute those changes
(2)How can I benefit from this situation (staying within the boundaries of law and morality)?

Rulers come and go. Ideological fads wax and wane. Existence continues.

COLLEGE EDUCATION – AN INVESTMENT WITH ALARMINGLY DIMINISHING RETURNS

Hundreds of thousands of Indian kids are being  put through college education by their parents by incurring costs ranging anywhere between Rs. 5,00,000/- (Rupees Five Lakhs) to Rs. 1,00,00,000/- (Rupees One Crore). Whereas in comparison very modest sums were spent on the college education of the parents of these kids, the parents have earned a return on investment on their education cost that will be far better than what their highly qualified wards can ever aspire to earn.  Thus, today’s children are being set up to be fiscal failures of sorts - in the sense that they will severely under-perform as compared to their parents in the matter of return on college education investment.

This is my proposition which I will proceed to systematically substantiate.

Parents born between 1955 and 1965 are the sample we will consider.  They are today between 50 and 65 years of age.  They have been in the work force for 30 years or more.  Their children are undergoing college education.  These are fairly reasonable assumptions for urban Indian demographics.

We add the following assumption.  Rs. 30000/- were spent on college tuition, other college expenses, lodging and boarding of the parents when they were put through college in the period between 1973 and 1987.  Rs. 30000/- is a fair average value for that period.  Given this data, I constructed the following table.

If this is the corpus (Rs.) built by a parent born between 1955-1965 after 30 years of work (excluding inheritance)…	…then this is the annual compounded return that has been obtained over a 30 year period, on the college spend
1 crore	21%
2 crore	24%
3 crore	26%
4 crore	27%
5 crore	28%
8 crore	30%
10 crore	31%
12.5 crore	32%
15.5 crore	33%
20 crore	34%

 A very basic compound interest formula was used to calculate the above values:

Corpus = 30000 x (1 + n)^30, n = 0.21, 0.24, 0.26 etc.

To put it in the form of a statement – “If one completed college education between 1973 and 1987 and after 30 years of work one had a corpus of Rs. 3 crores, excluding what one inherited from parents, then one earned a compounded yearly return of 26% on the Rs. 30000/- that were spent to put one through college”.

Now I calculate the average of the various percentages in the above table – it comes to 27.5%.  Thus on an average, the parents clocked a 27.5% return on cost of college.  This is the target I will set for the children’s generation.  That is, the children should match the average performance of their parents.  Actually, considering that today’s kids get far more attention, and will live in times far more competitive and “business oriented” than their parents, we should really be setting them a stiffer target.  But let that be.  Let us set them a target of 27.5%.

This time around we start with a statement and then we will expand it into a table.

“If your parents spend Rs. 15 lakhs on your college education, then to match your parents’ “return on college education cost” performance, after 30 years of work you must have an accumulated corpus of Rs. 220 crores apart from what you inherited from your parents.”

If this is the amount  (Rs.) being spent by  parents on college education…	…then to obtain a 27.5% annual return, this is the corpus (inheritance not included) that the child must accummulate  over a 30 year period
5 lakh	73 crore
10 lakh	146 crore
15 lakh	220 crore
20 lakh	300 crore
40 lakh	585 crore
60 lakh	880 crore
70 lakh	1000 crore
80 lakh	1200 crore
90 lakh	1300 crore
1 crore	1500 crore

The same formula as before, worked in reverse, was used here.

Without going into any further calculations, my prediction is as follows.  Today’s kids will, on an average, earn a 15% annual compounded return on college education cost, as compared to 27.5% earned by the kid’s parents.  Just glance through the required corpus amounts in the above table.  They are simply not achievable.  What a melancholy commentary this is on the state of affairs with regards to education and wages.  I am a parent from the aforementioned parents’ generation.  We believe (and rightly so) that our kids are smarter, they will work in a smarter world, they go to better colleges than us, they will be better qualified than us and the world today is an amazingly interconnected place where your competence is all that matters.  Yet, they will do very poorly as compared to us when it comes to fiscal return on college education costs.

“Education has become a business” – this is the most common refrain or complaint or lament that one hears from parents in India who are in the process of putting their kids through college.  It seems to me that education has indeed become a business … one in which the takings of those dispensing education are rising while the earnings of those receiving education are falling dramatically.

Thus, present day parents seem to have the following choices when deciding how much to spend on  their kids’ college education

(1)Think of the cost as an investment, project the reasonably likely returns on it and base decisions on this analysis.

(2)Think of the cost as an indulgence.

(3)Don’t think, just spend.  Give the kids the "very best" (?!).

THE WRINKLE OF SERENDIPITY

Serendipity: "the faculty or phenomenon of finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for".

The theorem of Pythagoras is taught in school.  I find it remarkable for two reasons.  It is a beautiful mathematical concept. Most kids have no trouble grasping it.

Let me state it for the record.  "In a right angled triangle, the sum of the squares of the lengths of the two sides of the right angle equals the square of the length of the hypotenuse."

Kids get put off by such mathematical statements.  So let us simplify this.

 


As per the theorem, in this triangle :

 Or, 9 + 16 = 25.
This is true for all right angled triangles.  If you draw a right angle with any arbitrary lengths instead of 3 and 4, the third side will "adjust" itself as per the rule given above.

Because this is such a unique feature of a right triangle, such groups of three numbers are called Pythagorean triplets.  "Pythagorean" because they follow from the theorem of Pythagoras.  Before the nationalists among us get all worked up and say "Indians discovered this rule and Pythagoras misappropriated it", it needs to be mentioned that the theorem is named after Pythagoras not because he discovered it, but because he was the first one to state its "proof".  In fact, the concept of "mathematical proof" was originated by Pythagoras.  So let us see what we mean by this...

One can draw any number of right triangles, measure the three sides and verify the rule of squares  described above.  But how many such triangles will one do it for?  The number of such right triangles is infinite.  Every time one comes across a right triangle with new dimensions, one can verify the rule.  But how about the next one?  "Mathematical proof" is a technique which in a generic way establishes that the theorem is true for any right triangle.  That was the greatness of Pythagoras and hence the theorem is rightly named after him.

Let us come back to the Pythagorean triplets.
9 + 16 = 25, hence 3,4,5 are a triplet (9 being square of 3, 16 being square of 4, 25 being square of 5)
25 + 144 = 169, hence 5, 12, 13 are a triplet (5 square 25, 12 square 144, 13 square 169)
36 + 64 = 100, hence 6, 8, 10 are a triplet (6 square 36, 8 square 64, 10 square 100)
These are some more triplets ... these appear in most school text books.
9,12,15
10,24,26
18,24,30

What I did not hear my teachers ask us or discuss with us is - "How many such triplets exist?". Since numbers are boundless or infinite in number, one would assume there are infinite such triplets. However the practice of Mathematics requires such claims to be proven.  Going one step beyond (or maybe stepping one step behind), one wonders - Can I produce such triplets at will?  The answer is Yes.

So let's go back to the proof bit for a while.  Those with some mathematical inclination must have or if not, definitely should read a book titled FERMAT'S LAST THEOREM written by Simon Singh.  A newspaper called EVENING STANDARD in its review of the book said, "It's a magnificent story, one told with infectious enthusiasm."  The book is a bit like the book A BRIEF HISTORY OF TIME by Stephen Hawkings.  Such books last one a lifetime.  One cannot possibly grasp every detail of every topic discussed.  But these books haunt us, they send even the most mathematically and scientifically disinclined among us on an enjoyable journey.

In the book, Simon Singh tells us that the Greek mathematician Euclid stated a proof for the belief that there exist an infinite number of Pythagorean triplets.  It is a simple proof which anybody who has completed ten years of school can understand by applying their minds slightly.  So really,  understanding the proof is straightforward.  What fills one with humility is the fact that Mathematics feels the absolute need to prove such things. What gives one a sense of mathematical history is the simplicity and certainty of the proof itself.

The real stunner for me however was different.  Very recently it came to my notice that an eleven year old boy "stumbled" upon this proof.  It has been six years since the kid discovered the proof and thereby taught himself a way to "manufacture" Pythagorean triplets.  The kid did not feel the need to "announce" this.  When I happened to ask the kid "Hey did you see Euclid's proof for infinite Pythagorean triplets?" he casually told me "Yeah I stumbled upon it in seventh standard when I was playing around with numbers in my mind."

It is tempting to conclude that such a kid is a genius.  However if one reads a bit about the history of Mathematics and some of the discoveries made, one is bound to conclude that such serendipity must dwell within tens if not hundreds of school kids all over the world. Being innocent and entirely devoid of an appetite for fame and recognition, they must stumble upon such facts and get on with their lives - friends, football, cricket, television.

And yet only a handful of kids go on to become "mathematicians".  So what happens along the way?  One could say serendipity dies a natural death as age advances.  I don't buy that.  Not entirely anyways.  Though it is true that Mathematics is a field for youth - it is said that hardly any mind boggling discoveries have been made by elder mathematicians, I can't believe that such serendipity dies a natural death in school.  So what looks upon such serendipity as a wrinkle and bears down upon with the scalding weight of a hot iron to smother it out?  I leave it to readers to draw their own conclusions.

For those interested, I present here the kid's method to manufacture Pythagorean triplets...

Take any odd number - say 37
Find its square - 37 squared = 1369
Find those two consecutive numbers which add up to 1369 (Divide 1369 by 2 to get 684.5 - then 684 and 685 are the numbers you are looking for - 684 + 685 = 1369)
Voila! ... 37, 684, 685 are your Pythagorean triplet!

Let us verify:-
37 square = 1369
684 square = 467856
685 square = 469225

467856 + 1369 is indeed = 469225!  Which means:

thereby proving that 37, 684 and 685 are indeed a Pythagorean triplet.

Now let's look at how this amazing "method" came about (more or less identical to Euclid's proof).  It is based on the following facts and observations
- Any natural number can be squared (1 square is 1, 2 square is 4, 3 square is 9 etc.)
- If you subtract each of these squares from the previous square, you get a sequence of odd numbers viz. 3,5,7,9,11,13,15... (Subtract 2 square from 1square, 3 square from 2 square etc.)
- Look at the sequence of odd numbers viz. 3,5,7,9,11,13,15,17,19,21,23,25... Some of them are perfect squares e.g. 9, 25, 49, 81....
- The million dollar observation: Each of the odd numbers in the above sequence are the sum of the original two consecutive natural numbers whose squares were subtracted

These statements put together and some close scrutiny of the numbers lead to the trick to produce Pythagorean triplets.

When I first read it and heard about it, it appeared simple.  And it is simple.  But I spent half a day trying to manufacture Pythagorean triplets myself - I used to get it right and then at times I used to get hopelessly confused.  But then - I possess neither serendipity nor high intelligence.

THE PEDAGOGY OF DIVISION

Quotient = 121, Remainder = 9

This is taught to kids somewhere in 4th or 5th standard.  Some kids get it instantly while others struggle.  Eventually most achieve some proficiency in it.  The proficiency is retained and strengthens during school days because the technique is needed to get past higher hurdles in Maths.

The technique possibly fades away from within those adults who move away from Maths.  It is safe to say that most adults are fairly uncomfortable teaching it to their kids and leave the task to teachers.

There are variants of this problem which may flummox kids and adults alike.  Once flummoxed, most may not know how to get out of the mess.  Here is an example of a rat hole that one might venture down when dividing.







Most of us forget as we go to higher classes, what division is all about.  Or for that matter, what each basic thing is all about.  We proceed mechanically, applying formulae and methods, arriving at answers and crossing over into the next class.  When I work with my daughter, she is extremely worried about us "not doing things the teacher's way".  She firmly believes that Maths is about doing things the "teacher's way".  It takes a lot of effort to convince her - It is fine if you don't score a 100% because you did not write the answer exactly the way teacher taught you in school.

The chapter on DIVISION in school books all over the world will have "exercises" listing a number of practice problems such as the ones demonstrated above. Kids are expected to solve them using the "method" taught in class.  I am yet to see a text book which lists just one problem in an exercise and says "Solve it in 5 different ways".

Think about it.  If an adult is given a bag of chocolates (which by the way contains 1582 chocolates) and is told to pack them into 13 packets to be distributed equally among 13 kids, how would the adult do it?  Spread out all chocolates on a table.  Start making 13 heaps, adding maybe 5 to each heap - that takes care of 65.  Then the adult realizes this is too slow, I can do better. So the next round probably is 20 in each heap and so on and so forth.  Most adults would not count all chocolates, realize they are 1582, then use the "method", count out 121 in each heap and realize 9 remain, would they?

So I wanted to show my 12 year old daughter another, logical/intuitive way to divide 1582 by 13.  But before I could start she said - Wait!  Then she looked hard at the that I had written down, and then wrote the following 123 x 13 = 1599.  Then she looked back at the 1582, was puzzled for a while, and wrote 121 x 13 = 1573.  Then she needed some prodding to reach the conclusion.  The point is, the child is already thinking in a way different from what was taught by the teacher.  I didn't have time to ask her how she hit upon 123 in the first place.  It would be really interesting to know.  For the record, my daughter is generally tagged as a child uninterested in studies (I confirm it) and makes every effort possible not to study.  She typically scores 50% marks in school exams.  I mention this so that folks do not dismiss the above example as "Ahh must be a really smart kid, can't expect every kid to come up with such things."

I had another way in mind, which I then proceeded to show her...

1582 / 13 - REMEMBER, WE ARE DISTRIBUTING 1582 CHOCOLATES AMONG 13 KIDS
I split 1582 as 1000 + 500 + 82
I will always look for opportunities to create multiples of 13 i.e. 13, 130, 1300 so that I can quickly distribute them into 13 parts
So I come up with 1000 + 300 + 200 + 82 i.e. 1300 + 200 + 82
I distribute 1300 among 13 so that each gets 100.
I am left with 200 + 82 which is 130 + 70 + 82 which is 130 + 152
I distribute the 130 among 13, thereby each getting 10 - added to the earlier 100, each has 110
Now I am left with 152 = 130 + 22
I again distribute the 130 among 13, each now has the accumulated 110 and 10 more = 120
So now each has 120 and I am left with 22
I split 22 = 13 + 9, distribute the 13 among 13 so that each gets 1, that make the accumulation 121
So now each part of the 13 parts has 121 and I am left with 9
9 obviously cannot be divided among 13 so I leave it as it is
QUOTIENT = 121, REMAINDER = 9
Was it that difficult?  And wasn't it intuitive? If you actually try it out, it is a lot more fun that teacher's method and can actually get addictive - like Sudoku.

As kids go into higher classes, they are taught squares.  By 7th/8th standard most kids will know that 13 x 13 = 169.  So if the 1582 divided by 13 problem is revisited at that time, some kids are going to look for 169's within the 1582, realizing that each can dissolve into 13 in each part.  Millions of kids in schools, God knows how many distinct ways of arriving at the answer exist ... if they are left to play around.  Instead we send them home with "homework" to complete - 20 problems of the same type.  And the poor souls are left with no choice put to mechanically apply "teacher's method" to complete the assignment ... because there is a mountain of homework to complete including other subjects.

Courtesy Wikepedia...
When Ramanujan heard that Hardy had come in a taxi he asked him what the number of the taxi was. Hardy said that it was just a boring number: 1729. Ramanujan replied that 1729 was not a boring number at all: it was a very interesting one. He explained that it was the smallest number that could be expressed by the sum of two cubes in two different ways.
There are two ways to say that 1729 is the sum of two cubes. 1x1x1=1; 12x12x12=1728. So 1+1728=1729 But also: 9x9x9=729; 10x10x10=1000. So 729+1000=1729 There are other numbers that can be shown to be the sum of two cubes in more than one way, but 1729 is the smallest of them.
This story is very famous among mathematicians. 1729 is sometimes called the “Hardy-Ramanujan number”.
Ramanujan did not actually discover this fact. It was known in 1657 by a French mathematician Bernard Frénicle de Bessy.

We all know and acknowledge that Ramanujan was a genius.  But what made him a genius?  He definitely was in love with numbers, and his mind had probably swum in numbers since early childhood.

That's what we need to allow our kids to do - enjoy numbers.  It might not take much more for them to become say one tenth of a Ramanujan.

DON'T TEACH BODMAS IN SCHOOL

One of the topics taught in school that do a great job of mystifying Mathematics for young students and confuse the hell out of them is BODMAS.

So what is BODMAS?
It stands for BRACKET OPEN-DIVISION-MULTIPLICATION-ADDITION-SUBTRACTION.
What does it do?  It imposes rules for a potentially ambiguous arithmetical problem.
Take this example:
4+5x3 = ?
One could say 4+5x3 = (4+5)x3 = 9+3=27.
Another could say 4+5x3 = 4+(5x3)=4+15=19.
Thus the same problem throws up two answers.
If we deem that to be a problem, then we need a solution for it.
BODMAS is the known solution.  It loosely says, given an ambiguous arithmetical problem (such as the one above), you are commanded to first solve BRACKET OPEN, then division, followed by multiplication, addition and finally subtraction in that order.

This, by the BODMAS dikat, 4+5x3=4+(5x3)=4+15=19.
So the 19 answer is correct and the 23 answer is wrong.
Applause!  Bravo BODMAS!!

(For the purpose of this discussion, I will leave aside BRACKET OPEN because this is not meant to be a BODMAS eulogy.

Now let us look at 4+5x3 differently.

I was begging on the street.  A man gave me 4 rupees and after that 5 women were kind enough to give me 3 rupees each.  I thus had 4 then 5x3 so 4+5x3=19.  The way I have told the story, it is indisputable that I had 19 rupees.  The confusion is about the way I wrote it.
Well, firstly, if I go through the string of numbers and operations from left to right (as is the practice), my story and the sequence match.
So 4+5x3=19.

I was begging on the street.  A man gave me 4 rupees and then a woman gave me 5 rupees.  Coincidentally, this happened 3 times.  So I got 9 rupees thrice hence I got 27 rupees.
So 4+5x3=27.
Well you could say, but this is not OK as per BODMAS.  So this couldn't have possibly happened? :-)

The point is, BODMAS claims to remove ambiguity.  But why not place the onus of being unambiguous on the fella who writes the arithmetic?  Just say - look use brackets so that you are sure you convey the meaning you intend.  Else don't blame others for interpreting things in a way you did not intend.

So write (4+5)x3 and it is sure to be interpreted as 27 or write 4+(5x3) and be sure it is 19.

So basically BODMAS condones ambiguity and claims to resolve it.  But you know, Pythagoras believed that the universe is constructed out of numbers.  Some great Mathematician has said "It is evident that the Great Architect of the universe was a Mathematician".  So Mathematics reflects life and vice versa.  Given that we demonstrated how 4+5x3 can practically play out in two different ways, what gives anybody the divine right to lay down BODMAS as a law?

Not to mention that BODMAS confuses the hell out kids.  Forget 4+5x3.  Consider 12+6/9x14-4x8.

If I were a teacher I would just skip the section on BODMAS.  Neither teach it not test kids on it.

By the way, other than in a chapter or section on BODMAS, BODMAS is not needed.  All books, exercises and examinations are carefully presented using brackets to make the arithmetic unambiguous.  Such as ((12+6)/9)*((14-4)x8)=82.

BODMAS is a solution to a non-problem.  Ignore it.

Another such utterly useless topic I want to write about is SQUARE ROOT BY THE DIVISION METHOD.  As of 2016 it appears in the Maharashtra SSC Board's class VII text book. I have asked by daughter to ignore it and instead resort to trial and error to find square roots of large perfect squares. Saves the child a lot of anguish and replaces it with a most interesting exercise.

WHY RESERVATIONS DON’T SUCK

This story is so true that anybody doubting its veracity is welcome to join me on a trip to my village town where all the necessary evidence including the people and documentation involved will be presented.  The doubting simons will be charged a fair amount for conveyance, lodge and board at my house and also for my time – after they are convinced of the details mentioned herein.

I know a person by the name JM in my village.  He runs a “vada pao-bhaji pao-chai” shop in the town market.  JM is illiterate, in his forties and runs a very tight shop.  He is also arguably the most honest and astute land agent in the town – I know that by experience. He is very hardworking, always in his shop by 5 AM getting ready for the market bustle to commence.  But he is as illiterate as they come.

Two weeks ago (i.e. in May 2016) JM called me and said his wife wanted to speak with me.  She is illiterate too.  She shares an equal burden with JM in running the shop.  So I spoke to her.  She wanted guidance in the matter of their daughter’s college admissions.  The daughter had just completed her XIIth (high school).  This is always a tricky proposition – small town folks asking a city-bred city dweller for educational guidance.  Eight years of intense exposure to rural and semi-rural Raigad have put me in a fairly good position to indulge in such guidance, but for the uninitiated, I would advice steering clear of getting into such a situation.  Because the chasm in expectations and intentions is so significant that nothing meaningful can result and plenty can go wrong.

After the preliminary questions, Mrs. JM told me she understood from Dr. Abdul Kalam’s book that Robotical Engineering (pronounced RAA-BAA-TEE-KAL VIN-JAY-NAY-RING by Mrs. JM) was the way to go.  I immediately had a “Oh man, there we go…” reaction within me.  I didn’t have the heart to tell her that not only did I not know what Robotical Engineering is, I don’t know anyone studying it in India and since I don’t see too many robots around, I would not recommend it as a branch of study for a rural kid looking for education that would lead to a white collar job in India.  And it was not as if the daughter had aced her exams – the marks reeled off over the phone were quiet pedestrian.  Mrs JM then urged me to visit them so that I could advise them in details in person.  I agreed.  Later I reviewed her performance in various “usual suspect” exams  - CBSE Board Exams, JEE Mains, NEET, MHCET etc.  My conclusion was she was a B- grader but at the same time knowing where she came from I knew the kid had already climbed a mountain or two in life.

An interesting aside about Mrs. JM just for perspective.  Once my wife accompanied me to JM’s vada-pao stall in the town market.  Mrs. JM was manning the shop.  While pleasantries were being exchanged and I was introducimg my wife to her, I noticed that Mrs. JM could not take her eyes off my wife.  After some time with a lot of hesitation in her manner and awe in her voice she asked my wife in Marathi, “Don’t you act in Marathi serials?”.  It was the sunglasses, sneakers and Marathi peppered with English words..

Over the next few days I had a few conversations with JM, Mrs. JM and their daughter over the phone.  I advised the daughter to consider B.Sc. (Agriculture) or Veterinary Medicine, because I know that these colleges/courses in Maharashtra accord preference to children of farmers.  I also told  her that these branches of education would likely get her a government job with rural relevance.  Well, I had completely misread their aspirations.  Folks from my surroundings in Mumbai posess a single-minded determination to put their kids on a plane to America come hell or high water.  For the JMs, it is relocation to Mumbai.

I finally visited my village and the JMs came over for a chat.  The JMs detailed out their game plan.  The kid would go to a “government college”.  She would use her caste certicate to get admitted (they belong to the Nomadic Tribes category).  They had no intentions to send her to a private college where they would have to part with huge fees.  Their first choice was Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Technological University, Lonere which is about 30 km from our village town.  I was quite impressed with the clarity of their plans.  I noted with even more interest their self-assurance regarding getting into a government-funded college which is part of a system that swears by affirmative action.  I perceived a sense of belonging in their expectations – sort of on the lines of “the government has laid out an infrastructure to aid people like us, and we will tap into it.”

I suddenly recalled an old colleague of mine, who is from Mumbai but studied at the said college.  He is a  human resources stalwart.  I called him immediately and laid bare my concerns – how do these “reservation kids”, who, with a below par performance in qualifying examinations get into engineering colleges riding on caste certificates, eventually turn out?  I was wondering whether once they enter the world of jobs they are relegated to pedestrian jobs well below their stated qualifications?  His response was stunning in what it revealed.  He said that 90% of his classmates from the said college were today working overseas – and that included those who qualified on the basis of caste certificates i.e. the so-called “reservation candidates”.  He reeled off names – X is working in IT in Singapore, Y is working for Aramco in Saudi Arabia, Z has been in the US for five years etc.  He did say that the reservation candidates started college  as weaklings with various handicaps – mainly that they were weaker in academics and had a poor knowledge of English and hence lagged behind in comprehension.  However he said confidently that as long as they were willing to compensate for the handicaps by dint of hard work, they eventually “made it”.  In most cases it took them a few extra years but they reached meaningful positions.  He connected me to a lady who was a “reservation candidate” in his class and came form the same vicinity as my village.  I called her.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that she and her husband ran a small successful IT firm in Vashi.  Moreover, she came across as any Mumbai-bred professional – I found no trace in her of a person who spent the first 16 years of her existence in a village – not that I find anything demeaning in it, but the business world and especially the world of IT does prefer an urbanized demeanour.

Now let’s see how JM made it happen for his daughter until now.  He told me she went to a boarding school called Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas in Nizampur, about 30 km from our village.  Apparently each district of Maharashtra has such a government-run CBSE school.  I Google’d and found http://www.jnvraigad.org/AboutUs.html.  You can check the website.

I have reproduced the About text from this site below.  So JM tapped into yet another government scheme, whereby his daughter went to this residential school without paying a penny.  And his son has followed in her footsteps, having moved there last year in 6^th standard.

In accordance with the National Policy on Education (1986), Government of India started Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas (JNVs). Presently the JNVs are spread in 27 States and 7 Union Territories. These are co-educational residential schools fully financed and administered by Government of India through an autonomous organization, Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti. Admission in JNVs are made through the Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalaya Selection Test (JNVST) at class VI.

The medium of instruction in JNVs is the mother tongue or regional language upto class VIII, and English thereafter for Maths and Science and Hindi for Social Science. Students of the JNVs appear for X and XII class examinations in the Central Board of Secondary Education. While education in the schools is free including board & lodging, uniforms and textbooks, a nominal fee of Rs. 200/- per month will be collected from the children from IX to XII class. However, childrenbelonging to SC/ST, Girls, Physically Handicapped and from the families whose income is below Poverty line are exempted from payment of fees.

So the long and short of it is as follows.  The daughter of an illiterate vada-pav vendor with an ancestral background of being from a Nomadic Tribe can go to a government-run CBSE school and a government-funded engineering college with severely sub-par marks in the qualifying public examinations and eventually be deemed fit to be hired my enterprises for jobs overseas.  And it seems like this can be the rule rather than the exception.

Simple deductive logic tells me that reservations don’t suck – not necessarily.  They can work.

For my part this is is deal I have struck with the kid -  I will mail her a book (English), which she will read to the best of her abilities.  If she does not understand any word in it, she will stop reading, Google the word on her phone until she gets the meaning and pronunciation.  Once she is done with the book, she will call me and we will discuss the book for half an hour.  The conversation will be strictly in English.  Then we go on to the next book.  The first book is on its way … Hemmingway’s The Old Man And The Sea.