Cool Bihari: January 2008

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Bihar's long cherished dream

Bihar is likely to start the first batch of its much awaited IIT from the current academic year 2008-09.The Union HRD ministry asking the state government to provide details of the infrastructure needed for its launch in a temporary building. In a letter to chief secretary RJM Pillai, the special secretary in the Union HRD ministry, KM Acharya, has asked the state government to "identify the temporary premises for the proposed IIT with a built-up area of around 38,000 square feet".

This is much awaited and well deserved start in the effort to put Bihar once again on the global education map. World’s oldest university at Nalanda is also likely to start its functioning by next year. Former President APJ Kalam has been personally monitoring the efforts for Nalanda University and he also visited Patna to discuss the work going in this regard.The proposed plan to start IIM at Patna is also on its way and the Ministry of HRD with Bihar Govt is trying to work out the modalities for the proposed Business school at Patna in collaboration with the IIM’s.

Ask any statistician he will tell you that Bihar’s literacy rate is perhaps one of the lowest in the country but what he will not tell you is that the how Bihari students have been topping in most of the competitive exams in the country. IIT-JEE or CAT , UPSC or Railways chances are that Bihari students will definitely figure in the merit list. To secure good ranks in the best academic institution is a dream for most of the Bihari students and their parents. What’s most inspiring is the fact that these students are mostly from semi urban and lower middle class families from remote districts of Bihar. These parents dedicate themselves and spend their life’s saving to realize their kids’ dream of getting the best higher education. I have seen how thousands of parents beat the scorching sun to secure forms of coaching institutes and competitive entrance exams. They take loans from friends, relatives and banks to take care of their kid’s education.

Try reserving a train to Delhi, Pune or Bangalore just after the board exams and you’ll see the mad rush to these cities for securing admissions. Perhaps there’s no better example than that of Patwa toil((weaver community) in Gaya ,Bihar where more than hundreds of students have secured place in IIT’s and REC’s. What’s even more inspiring is that the sons of this small community have been guiding the young ones in the community to start focusing on the basic from the start so that they do not face the same odds when it comes to crack these competitive exams. They come back to their villages and hold free training classes for engineering aspirants.

Another amazing success story is of the Super 30 batch which is run by Anand Kumar, a Maths wizard, along with a senior Bihar IPS officer Abhayanand. The duo helps meritorious students from economically weaker section of the society to compete for IIT-JEE and in the last 5 years they have helped more than 100 students to secure top ranks in JEE.Every year thousand of student appear to secure seat in the Super 30 batch which means they get free coaching and other support for realizing their dream.

All this has happened without any Government support or any organized funding, the best and meritorious students of Bihar have been chasing their dreams braving all odds and with the start of these prestigious institutions in Bihar it’s positively likely to make their dreams closer than ever before.

Labels: Bihar 2.0, Bihar Economic Development, Education in Bihar, IIM, IIT Patna, IIT-JEE, Nalanda University

Posted by Ajit Chouhan at 10:42 PM | Permalink | Comments

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Bihar on accelerated growth track

In the last few years Bihar has seen drastic improvement in the areas fiscal management and revenue collection.None other than the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor, Y. V. Reddy, lauded Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar for “accelerating” the pace of development in Bihar and assured the banking sector’s special attention to it.

“Finance minister P. Chidambaram, too, has signalled for special attention to Bihar in view of its government’s interest in accelerating development here,” Reddy told reporters after meeting Nitish Kumar and senior state officials. The RBI governor, who addressed a bankers’ meeting, said: “We are working on to improve the inter-institutional mechanism and develop co-operation between the banking sector and the state agencies.”

Reddy said the improvement in inter-institutional mechanism will open a “new chapter of co-operation” and collaboration between banks and the state agencies. He added that the challenges before Bihar were “daunting”. “But the RBI would help the state in providing relief to the flood-hit people, ensuring education loans to students and promoting medium and small-scale industries.”

Another indicator of Bihar revived financial system is the latest data on Central Excise tax collection. Bihar figures amongst the top 10 states of the country on the front of central excise tax collection. According to the Patna commissione rate of the central excise, revenue amounting to Rs 3,926 crore is likely to be generated as central excise in the current fiscal (2007-08) from the state.

"The department had collected Rs 2,831 crore till December 31, 2007 and we are likely to cross the target of the current fiscal," said central excise commissioner M S Badhan on Wednesday.

This is not for the first time that the state has generated so much of revenue as the collection in the previous fiscal (2006-07) too was quite healthy with the Patna commissione rate contributing Rs 3,400 crore as central excise.

Labels: Bihar 2.0, Bihar Economic Development, Bihar Finance, Development Projects in Bihar

Posted by Ajit Chouhan at 11:37 AM | Permalink | Comments

Primary Education in Bihar

A recent report on primary education in Bihar presents the slow progress which the state has made in improving the infrastructure and support system.NTY reports on the odds which are faced by the school administration and challenges of imparting quality primary education in lathora,Bihar.

India has long had a legacy of weak schooling for its young, even as it has promoted high-quality government-financed universities. But if in the past a largely poor and agrarian nation could afford to leave millions of its people illiterate, that is no longer the case. Not only has the roaring economy run into a shortage of skilled labor, but also the nation’s many new roads, phones and television sets have fueled new ambitions for economic advancement among its people — and new expectations for schools to help them achieve it.

That they remain ill equipped to do so is clearly illustrated by an annual survey, conducted by Pratham, the organization for which Mr. Ghosh works. The latest survey, conducted across 16,000 villages in 2007 and released Wednesday, found that while many more children were sitting in class, vast numbers of them could not read, write or perform basic arithmetic, to say nothing of those who were not in school at all.

Despite these odds we have some encouraging news as well . A teenage girl's success story in educating herself against all odds while rearing honeybees for a livelihood has found a place in a school textbook produced by the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT).Anita Kushwaha, 17, has encouraged and inspired thousands of women in rural Bihar to be self-reliant.

NCERT has included a new chapter on the success story of Anita - titled "Anita and the honey bees" in a Class IV book on environmental studies called "Looking Around".The chapter describes Anita, popularly known as "queen bee", as a role model for students and others for her efforts in educating herself and taking to beekeeping to increase the family income.

The chapter is full of amazing but true stories of Anita, born to poverty-stricken parents. Both her parents work as agricultural labourers.Anita's determination to educate herself despite poverty has been termed in the book as a "great struggle".

Her determination to take to beekeeping has proved to be a turning point in supplementing her family's income and funding her school as well as college education. Later, dozens of women of her village took to beekeeping to earn their livelihoods and educate their children.

Labels: Anita, Development Projects in Bihar, Education in Bihar

Posted by Ajit Chouhan at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments

Sunday, January 13, 2008

Kapil's Eleven in Patna

Veteran Cricket and former India Captain Kapil Dev was in Patna recently to inaugurate his “Elevens” restaurant. The only Indian cricket captain who made India proud by winning the only World Cup India has. The president of Indian Cricket League or ICL had been to the state capital for inauguration of his restaurant at Fraser Road. He spoke about the good things which have been shaping up in Bihar and asked the citizens of the state to show more accountability towards bringing about a culture of positive change.

With his usual smile he thanked patnaites and invited them to his restaurant that takes challenges for a difference in taste and style.

Talking to media persons he reacted over the bad umpiring issue that galloped Indian team in Australia. "Steve Buckner should think himself what he did to the match, actually his bad umpiring has embarrassed the game at a whole". Watch the video of his interview here.

Labels: Bihar 2.0, Bihar Cuisines, Bihar Tourism, Kapil Dev's Eleven, Lifestyle

Posted by Ajit Chouhan at 1:20 PM | Permalink | Comments

The real Bihar..

It’s interesting to observe the piquant dichotomy which Bihar presents to the world. On one hand a media report observed how the lack of proper transportation facility in rural Bihar makes life difficult for people and so they end up circumventing the system to beat the travel blues.

On the other hand Railways have recently introduced a new high-tech system through which passengers can procure their reserved-journey tickets from ATM counters. Patna Junction is likely to have this facility soon, said Danapur DRM B D Garg. According to Garg, the railways have introduced this system with an aim to provide more facilities to passengers as well as to reduce rush of passengers at the main computerised reservation counters. Patna Junction has been allotted eight ATM counters of which three have already started functioning for purposes other than the reserved-journey tickets.

Despite the progress which the railways have made, chances are that the rest of country is more likely to recall the first incident in which folks in rural Bihar stop the train for boarding by waving Rs 20 note. But will someone represent Bihar for the good things and changes are taking place on ground.

Recent anti corruption drive against the govt officials have helped in changing the impression of the executive functionaries in the state. Over 200 officials have been caught red-handed while accepting bribe during the drive which began in August 2006, Additional Director General (Vigilance) Neelmani said.

Based on this we can say that two officials are being trapped almost every week for taking illegal gratifications for bestowing undue favour," he said. Informing that the bureau had registered around 165 such cases since August 2006, he said, "The catching of five officials, including a block development officer, in the two weeks of this year proves beyond doubt that the vigilance has further intensified its drive."

These efforts needs to be lauded as the system is back on track to deliver the goods, the drive against the menace of corruption has restored the faith of common man in the administration and it has set great example for others to follow as well.

Labels: Bihar, Bihar Govt.

Posted by Ajit Chouhan at 12:53 PM | Permalink | Comments

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Vote for our Super Heroes

Dr Abhyanand and Anand Kumar have been nominated for CNN IBN Indian of year in the Public Service category for providing free coaching, boarding and lodging to 30 poor students for the IIT JEE Exams every year. For achieving successful scores for 28 out of the 30 students this year.

Please cast your vote for them and recognize their efforts to realize the dreams of the meritorious but under privileged students from Bihar.

Labels: Bihari Newsmakers, Bihari Talent, Indian of the Year, Super 30

Posted by Ajit Chouhan at 11:42 PM | Permalink | Comments