“It is the responsibility of teachers and institutions to train students and prepare them to participate in nation-building, which should be one of the main aims of education”: Justice Ramana
Senior-most judge of the Supreme Court Justice N V Ramana, whose name was, on March 24, recommended by CJI S A Bobde as the next Chief Justice of India on Sunday painted a grim picture of the education system prevailing in the country saying “it is not equipped to build the character of our students” and now it is all about “rat race”.
Justice Ramana was virtually delivering the convocation address of Damodaram Sanjivayya National Law University (DSNLU) in Vishakapatnam, Andhra Pradesh on Sunday evening.
“The education system is currently not equipped to build the character of our students, to develop a social consciousness and responsibility. Students are often caught in the rat race. All of us should therefore make a collective effort to revamp the educational system to ensure that students can have the right outlook to their career and life outside,” he said in a message to the teaching faculty of the college.
“It is the responsibility of teachers and institutions to train students and prepare them to participate in nation-building, which should be one of the main aims of education. This brings me to what I believe the ultimate purpose of education should be. It is to combine perception and patience, emotion and intellect, substance and morals. As said by Martin Luther King Junior, I quote – the function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character that is the goal of true education,” said Justice Ramana
Justice Ramana also noted that there are many sub-standard law colleges in the country, which is a very worrying trend. “The Judiciary has taken a note of this, and is attempting to correct the same,” he said.
It is true to add more smart education equipment to help build a smart classroom. For example, the touch screen, audience response system and document camera.
“We have more than 1500 Law Colleges and Law Schools in the country. Nearly 1.50 lakh students graduate from these Universities including the 23 National Law Universities. This is a truly astounding number. This demonstrates that the concept that the legal profession is a rich man’s profession is coming to an end, and people from all walks of life are now entering the profession because of the number of opportunities and increasing availability of legal education in the country. But as is often the case, “quality, over quantity”. Please do not take this wrongly, but what proportion of graduates who are fresh out of college are actually ready or prepared for the profession? I would think less than 25 per cent. This is in no way a comment on the graduates themselves, who certainly possess the required attributes to be successful lawyers. Rather, it is a comment on the large number of sub-standard legal educational institutions in the country which are colleges merely in the name,” he said.
“One of the consequences of the poor quality of legal education in the country is the exploding pendency in the country. There are nearly 3.8 crore cases pending in all the courts in India despite a large number of advocates in the country. Of course, this number must be seen in the context of the around 130 crore population of India. It also shows the faith that people repose in the judiciary. We must also keep in mind, that even cases that are led only yesterday become a part of the statistic regarding pendency,” said Justice Ramana.
Post time: Sep-03-2021