Page 124 - EW November 2024

Postscript

Indigestible banquet VSM, Chief Executive of the invariably top-ranked Indus
However, this year Lt. Gen. (Retd.) Arjun Ray, PVSM,

UTYEN’S DELHI IS A WORLD APART. ITS cel- International School, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Pune —
ebrated bureaucrats and policy formulators with who regularly led a large delegation to the annual EWISR
Lthe power to shape the destinies of entire genera- Awards — was conspicuously absent. Perhaps because
IIS-Bangalore, hitherto ranked India’s #1 international
tions -- and compliant academics — have little awareness
of the grassroots infirmities of the Indian economy. The day-cum-boarding school for 13 years consecutively, and
other IIS institutions ranked among the Top 10, failed to
third Kautilya Conclave was organised by the Institute
of Economic Growth (IEG), a Delhi-based think-tank replicate the feat. This year IIS-Bangalore was demoted to
#3, below The International School, Bangalore, Path-
established by the indefatigable academic-bureaucrat ways World School, Gurgaon and Lancers International,
N.K. Singh, who has arguably the longest service record Gurgaon.
in top-level Union government positions. Despite his brilliant record in the Indian Army and
The conclave was graced by Union finance minister ideating and establishing four high-end IB-affiliated
Nirmala Sitharaman and Prime Minister Modi (both internationally benchmarked K-12 schools, Ray is
opined that the ‘Indian Era’ of global domination is reportedly sulking in his tent because IIS-Bangalore has
around the corner) and discussed and debated the entire been toppled from its customary premier rank. Perhaps
gamut of issues covering sustainable economic growth, this setback is not unconnected with this year’s survey
managing inflation, financing the green transition, geo- not being conducted by the Delhi-based market research
economic fragmentation, artificial intelligence, public and firm C fore whose CEO, Premchand Palety, a routine
foreign policy, rural regeneration. With keynote speakers, visitor to the IIS-B campus in the garden city. This year’s
panel chairs and speakers invited (all expenses paid by 8,700 sample respondents interviewed by AZ Research
the Union finance ministry) from blue-chip universities Partners, Bangalore decisively favoured perennial
worldwide, the conclave was undoubtedly a festival of the bridesmaid TISB as numero uno by a wide margin. Back
intellect providing a banquet for thought. at the EWISR Awards event, there was disappointment
However in the opinion of your editor, a ‘direct pay- that delegates were denied the general’s annual sermon.
ment’ invitee, although an optional panel discussion on
health and education reforms was scheduled, the learned
delegates showed little awareness of the “centrality of Poor rich billionaire
education” and human resource development. Your edi-
tor’s anguished pleas that substantially bigger budgets HE PASSING OF RATAN TATA LAST MONTH
for public education are the essential pre-condition of aroused bitter-sweet memories of this industry
dawn of the Indian Era were cut short with remarks such Ttycoon who I interviewed on several occasions in
as “input doesn’t guarantee outcomes” and “the prior- my previous avatars as editor of Business India and Busi-
ity is expenditure efficiency,” by grey eminences who nessWorld. In the 1980s the Tata empire ruled by JRD
themselves reported impressive academic credentials Tata from Bombay House was run by powerful warlords
from the world’s most well-furbished universities. It was such as Russi Modi (Tata Steel); S. Mulgaokar (Tata Mo-
also humbling that that none of the delegates had heard tors); Darbari Seth (Tata Chemicals); Ajit Kerkar (Indian
of this tiny organ published south of the Vindhiyas, de- Hotels), A.H. Tobbacowala (Voltas) among others, who
spite our undisputed claim of being India’s #1 education ran their companies with minimal supervision from JRD.
magazine. In this league, Ratan Tata (JRD’s nephew) managing
This consensus left your correspondent bemused about NELCO, a loss-making electronics company in the 1990s,
how such great minds can entertain this pipe-dream of a was a cipher and it was by no means certain that Ratan
globally respected economy in which over 50 percent of was JRD's natural successor.
teens can’t read class III textbooks and only 2 percent of In particular Russi Modi, front-runner to succeed JRD,
industrial workers have received formal skills training. was openly disparaging Ratan, despite the latter having
Indigestible banquet. drawn up an intelligent plan for the Tata Group to divest
consumer good companies and focus on a few big ones.
General MIA This plan was positively written up in BusinessWorld.
Years later, when the war of words between Ratan
and Russi intensified, Ratan requested me to put his
N EVERY METRIC THE THREE-DAY EW INDIA case forward. Despite Russi Modi being a friend, on
School Rankings Awards 2024-25 conclave staged merits of the case, I wrote in my weekly column in The
Oin the 7-star Leela Ambience Hotel, Gurgaon, Delhi Independent (now defunct) that Ratan was the better
NCR, which concluded on October 19, was a resounding choice as Chairman of Tata Sons. That essay ended my
success. This conclave was the follow-up of the Educa- friendship (Ratan was a mere acquaintance) with Russi.
tionWorld India School Rankings Survey 2024-25 — the Many years later when EducationWorld was flounder-
world’s largest and most comprehensive schools ranking ing, I wrote to Ratan — a professed champion of educa-
survey which rated and ranked over 4,000 primary- tion who had recently endowed a library at Harvard — to
secondary schools in 458 cities and towns countrywide provide some advertising support. Tata responded with
under three main and 14 sub-categories (to eliminate a long letter explaining business was bad and the then
apples with oranges type comparisons) under 14 param- Rs.80,000 crore Tata Group couldn’t afford the expense.
eters of school excellence. An unredeemed IOU.

124 EDUCATIONWORLD NOVEMBER 2024