Page 6 - EducationWorld March 2022

From the

Editor
THE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT MAGAZINE
(Lucknow); Rajiv Desai, Dr. Parth Shah, Jeroninio W ith the third wave Omicron variant of the novel Corona-
Volume X XIII No.3

BOARD OF ADVISORS
N.R. Narayana Murthy, H.V. Gowthama, Shukla
Bose, Dr. Glenn Christo, Dr. R. Natarajan
(Bangalore); Adi Godrej, Dr. Augustine Pinto,
Krishan Khanna, Guilherme Vaz, Ketan Gala,
virus, which ill-advisedly prompted first the Central and
Kirit Mehta, Balkishan Sharma (Mumbai); Dr.
Ramdas Pai (Manipal); Dr. Geeta Kingdon
lockdown (82 weeks) of education institutions from pre-
Almeida, Premchand Palety (Delhi); Dr. Kannan later state governments to impose the most prolonged
Gireesh (Chennai); Robindra Subba (Kurseong); primaries to universities upon the children of India not proving as deadly as
Sanjeev Bolia (Kolkata); Dr. Achyuta Samanta the previous Delta variant, schools, colleges and universities have resumed
(Bhubaneswar); Shyama Thakore (London)
on-campus teaching-learning. However because of exaggerated caution in the
EDITOR matter of reopening schools for fear of the impact of the virus on children,
Dilip Thakore teachers and the world’s largest child and youth population have a long, hard
MANAGING EDITOR road ahead to make good the learning loss of almost two years.
Summiya Yasmeen In my opinion, the best solution is to declare the past two academic years
CHIEF SUB-EDITOR 2020-21 and 2021-22 — the education lockdown was imposed on March 25,
Sundar Anand 2020 and has only recently been relaxed — zero academic years. That is chil-
Paromita Sengupta, Reshma Ravishanker, Gopi dren in K-12 education, even if not in higher education, should start the new
Chand N, (Bangalore), Autar Nehru (Delhi) academic year from the time they were shut out of classrooms. Or if not for
9868256512, Baishali Mukherjee (Kolkata)
9836491981, Shivani Chaturvedi (Chennai) two years, at least for one.
9500506102, Dipta Joshi (Mumbai) 9920243111 Mysteriously, this proposal is considered blasphemous. This proposition
CHIEF EXECUTIVE made in a lead feature in our February issue (educationworld.in/declare-
Bhavin Shah +91 9867382867 2021-22-as-zero-academic-year/) has been greeted with sullen silence by
MARKETING teacher and parent communities. But there’s no side-stepping the grim reality
West: Tejas Pattni (General Manager) 9022487997 that in the vast majority of the country’s 1.5 million primary schools — espe-
E-mail: marketing@educationworld.in cially historically under-provisioned 1.2 million government schools — chil-
South India: Poonam Shah 9731966373
North: Hannan Ahmed 9810302768 dren have not received any meaningful education for two years.
In this connection, the deafening silence from Shastri Bhavan, Delhi which
GRAPHICS
Suresh K. houses the Union education ministry and its newly (July 2021) appointed
SUBSCRIPTIONS minister Dharmendra Pradhan, is bewildering. Even as all requests for an
interview remain unacknowledged, one has not heard a single utterance from
Kiran Kumar: 9108225694/
080 43711141 the Rt. Hon’ble minister on vital issues such as reopening of schools, reme-
sub@educationworld.in dial education, the meagre provision for education in Union Budget 2022-23,
ONE YEAR SUBSCRIPTION: RS.1700 mental health and well-being of children during the prolonged lockdown, or
OVERSEAS SUBSCRIPTION: USD95 indeed any words of comfort or reassurance to the world’s largest population
Cheques/drafts in favour of DT Media &
Entertainment Pvt. Ltd. Bangalore of children and youth.
Be that as it may, in this issue we present a ten-point agenda to rescue In-
EDITORIAL
C3-36, 3rd Floor, Devatha Plaza dia’s cruelly neglected children and youth from the hard grind ahead of them
131 Residency Road, Bangalore 560 025. following the world's longest education lockdown. Even if the minister has no
Tel: 080 22480880; Fax: 2227 5962; time for our prescription, educationists, educators and enlightened parents
E-mail: editorial@educationworld.in
should study it seriously. There’s too much at stake.
Printed and published by Dilip Thakore on behalf Our unprecedented cover story apart, there’s much more in this first post-
of DT Media & Entertainment Pvt. Ltd.
Printed at Rajhans Enterprises, 134, 4th Main, In- pandemic issue. Check out our second lead story on the rising popularity of the
dustrial Town, Rajajinagar, Bangalore-44. Published Gap Year, our stimulating People profiles, editorials and book reviews. Even
at C3-36, 3rd Floor, Devatha Plaza, 131 Residency though I may not be entirely objective, no other news publication provides as
Road. Bangalore 560 025. rich a mix.
Editor Dilip Thakore.
RNI No. KARENG/1999/00234
Website: www.educationworld.in

6 EDUCATIONWORLD MARCH 2022