An Open Letter

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Graduate of UBC


An Open Letter to

The Right Honorable Smriti Z. Irani,

Minister for HRD

Government of India



Dear Minister,

Please accept my congratulations at your new appointment. Many highly educated Indians and academics including myself are highly excited and pleased in finally seeing an energetic and capable young Minister for education in India. Unfortunately it has not always been so in India and as a result, standards of education have suffered.

It may be mentioned that this letter comes to you from a person who has attained the highest levels of formal education, from the finest of universities as available in our world. These include the Indian Institute of Technology at Delhi for a bachelors plus masters degree (with distinction and top rank) and doctor’s degree from the University of British Columbia in Canada on a doctoral fellowship of the university. Later, there was good fortune to serve on the faculty of these esteemed universities before retiring  from one of the senior positions of administration of higher education in India, at a privately operated Institute of Science and Technology, of Uttarakhand Technical University, a few years ago. I am recognized as an International educator and my public profiles are available on Wikipedia, Google scholar and linkedin etc. Therefore, this letter comes to you from a person of knowledge and authority in the domain of education.

May we also speak of some criticism, if somewhat politically in this and the next paragraph, that is circulating in the media that political personalities must face from opposing political parties. The first of these is the fact that you do not have a university degree yourself. It is my experience that although an education up to high school level is frequently necessary for basic educational skills, university level education is vastly different and highly varied. More often than not, an education a person may acquire in life is of greater importance than formal university education except perhaps for a career in research and academics or certain professions such as medicine. It is also used as a minimum benchmark or shortlisting criterion in employment for persons who cannot be assessed easily by other means. However a politician is examined in a court of millions of people and does not need such a certificate, especially a certificate with which many cannot even find a peon's job in the country.. Aside from that as said, many who have acquired their education in a wider arena of life rather than a university have excelled. It is because of this that some of the most successful persons of our world have not had a formal degree from a university in various areas ranging from politics to innovation and business.

Some of the most successful Prime Ministers of India in the past were those without university degrees and if they were not able to achieve much for India it was because of other reasons that include the excess baggage those who belong to dynasties are forced to carry and also in part because of  governance deficit and corruption that seems to have prevailed over the country ever since the British left, ironically ever since India became free to be as corrupt as it liked if it so chose.. If the help of university educated is required by a Minister, there are numerous others such as me available to provide that input whenever required. Few areas require a specialist to head a ministry except perhaps for the sports ministry that is highly handicapped by a person who is not a sportsman as it was in the past and it caused much international shame for India in the world of sports.

The second criticism has been that in some early official document you mentioned the fact of a BA degree that you did not in later ones. From this I have concluded that you were pursuing a BA degree at some stage but later dropped it after finding worthier pursuits as indeed the most successful persons of our world such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs also did. Perhaps you forgot to add the words (pursuing) in brackets in the original document due to very young age then or a rush of activity or oversight and have obviously not mentioned that you were pursuing that course in later documents because you stopped to pursue it. It is heartening to note that the public concerns itself with such minor typographical errors from your side, as they have not with others, showing their high level of expectation and hope from a person of your brilliance.

May I once again extend my heartiest congratulations to you and convey that I and many others like me are available for any service or assistance to you,  that you may require from any advanced degree holder, to help you improve the state of education at all levels in our country.

With best wishes,

Yours sincerely
Dr. Ashok Malhotra
B. Tech,. M. Tech., (IIT Delhi)  Ph. D. (UBC Canada)

PS: Due to my age and name if you regarded this letter as similar to one from a father to a daughter, that would not be out of place. Blessings and best wishes

The author in Nainital District with godson and god-grandson


 Nalanda University, the first international university in the world
An online article by the author on Nalanda University is at http://ashokmalhotra.wordpress.com/2013/08/18/recreating-the-worlds-first-university-nalanda/

Comments

Ramanathan said…
a nice warm letter; hope she reads it.
Dr R. Suryanarayanan, PAris
May 29, 2014 at 3:44 AM
ProfAshok said…
Thanks Ramanathan. Yes I hope she does too. To ensure that I have posted a link of it on her facebook page as well as sent her intimation on her Twitter account and to BJP on twitter too with copy to the honorable PM Modi ji. Therefore I do think she will read it.
May 29, 2014 at 3:59 AM
ProfAshok said…
Since I posted this letter early this morning, it has undergone some slight editing a few times. Hopefully it is final now.
May 29, 2014 at 9:21 AM
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