Early Retirement

The idea of early retirement, in vogue in the West for a long time, has caught up very fast in India too off late. It means two things: first is the good one that a good number of people can afford to save, and second is not so that the working ecology is troublesome. For, the first we must thank the liberalization process, which values good work and has gained some ground amidst overwhelming collectivist tendencies. And for the second issue, the policy and public intellectuals must think over how to make work fulfilling and enjoyable.

Niraj Kumar Jha

On Conflict and Declining Agency of Democracy

Conflicts we see today are the conflicts among the variants of the same sentiment. The sentiment by its property is conflict causing. It is leftism: the ancient proclivity of some men to believe in being the Master or the Messanger. The successful ones let the imagined control the real.

 

Another associated problem is the declining agency of democracy, humanism operationalised. We need to extricate democracy from leftism and restore humanism.

 

Niraj Kumar Jha

Normalising the Normative

The gap between the normal and the normative is the most treacherous field. It is in this space the progress and the regress battle each day. The normative invariably seeks to meta-normalise or abnormalise the normal, and the normal is perennially distressed by being ever wanting in its efforts to adopt the commands of the pioneers and priests of the norms. What we need is to normalise the normative so that everyone is at peace with themselves.

 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

A University

A university is a community of scholars working with the universe of knowledge, i.e. discovering, refining, preserving, and disseminating the knowledge. At a university, scholars are divided by their specialisations but united by the purpose of integrating and advancing knowledge at any level of human existence. Each specialisation contributes to the knowledge, its methods and purposes. And, being a community, the members of the university learn from each other even by their most casual interactions. Thus, the knowledge advances more in an informal manner in a university. A university is above all an association for the mission: the collective good.

A nation's state and the people's life depend on the quality of universities. Greater goodness has no other means to itself. It must not be missed that university at its core is not an administrative unit or a specialised institution of learning. And, great universities grow supported by nourishing soil. The issue is to allow universities to take their own shape organically. They must be fully autonomous and largely self-sustaining and guarded against any influence which inhibits the faculty of any member in a negative way.

The functional universities where knowledge is alive and speaking sustain societies in their goodness. It's not the other way round.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Celebratism

Social media activities betray a grave social evil: celebratism. The obsessive desire of being feted, though it remains elusive for the most, is turning out to be pathetic. Part of this malady is that if people have nothing to represent or express, they post content about 'celebrities' and wish to be seen in the reflected light. Fine, but it's not exactly fine. One neglects the issues and persons really affecting his or her life, and does harm to self and society. And very tragically compromises one's dignity without realising this. One must represent purpose and relevance, and speak of his or her existential space on the main.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Education Online

Education is now heavily online. It creates great opportunities as well as poses grave threats to the education sector. Education is now truly international as students seek multiple skills and certifications. Institutions and organisations would compete for students globally. The prospective learners would also scout for the most suitable courses/additional courses internationally. And the great race would have its winners and losers in which the size, reputation, and efficiency of an entity would be the determining factors. The process would have a homogenising tilt too. We also must get ready to make the best of the opportunities and ward off the threats.

 

Niraj Kumar Jha

On Knowledge and Ignorance

It seems that almost every person is highly annoyed by ignorant people. And, add insult to injury, the person feels the others being stubbornly resistant to learn. What appears to me is that people are more knowledgeable or less knowledgeable. And it is the same thing as being less or more ignorant. But, it is all contextual. In fact, the real test for being learned, as I can see, is not about the quality or quantity of knowledge one possesses but is about the approach. Kabir had put it very succinctly, and irrefutably, that knowledge is love. And as it is ontologically, so it is epistemologically. Knowledge is valuing knowledge and the continuous drive for knowledge. On the mundane level or on the practical plane, knowledge and ignorance is a critical issue as it may be a matter as grave as the occurrence of avoidable large-scale deaths. And in general, it involves the quality of life, which may be unnecessarily quite abysmal for a larger number of people in a given society. And the reason for the tragedies and the abysmal living, intriguingly maybe the very successful implementation of the operating ideas held as knowledge by the society. What is the way out? Again knowledge, more than about knowing, is one's commitment towards it. One must engage with other people with love and respect in order to enable the person to avoid ignorant ways and go for knowledge-based options. When such engagement takes place with affection and respect, there is an equal chance of realising that what one considers knowledge is wholly or partially fallacious or irrelevant. And, there is no other way than the shared civic pursuit of knowledge for improving our living experience.

 

Niraj Kumar Jha