Education in India is a fundamental right, and a joke for those who don’t have big pockets. It is well known that the disparity is unequivocally real, and the divide is higher than ever. The divisive nature of education comparative in debates of why the State Boards are better/worse than it’s other well known CBSE and ICSE counterparts is a weird thing to consider as all these institutions are not here to fight for who’s better, they are here to educate and uplift the masses.

For the poor, the CBSE and ICSE systems are foreign. They only have access to the State Board systems, where they are sold a lie. A lie that their child will get the education they deserve, the nutrition they need with a side of a world they can conquer and live in. Education is their only chance of getting rid of the lakhs upon lakhs of debt accumulated just to survive one more day and let the child study.

For the middle class, CBSE and ICSE are the way to go. The parents were wronged by the State Schools, so they do not want their kids to go to those schools. It becomes a thoughtcrime for the child to speak in a language other than English at these schools. Although a good measure to create a common identity, yet horribly implemented as some schools even fine people. Yet these educational boards don’t like that enough and they want more. They drill into the mind of the child to never speak up to teachers, never ask “absurd” questions and to never go against the command of the one in-charge.

For both of them, there rises one thing in common, merit.

Here comes Indian Meritocracy. The age old promise of upliftment, gift-wrapped in money and stinking of the influence by the mighty rich. This free and fair system of evaluation gives everyone apparent “equality” in the eyes of the exam. But what about the commodification of competitive exams?

Exams in India are a way of life. Fifth graders are now taking foundation coaching classes for their studies to get into the top medical and engineering colleges in India. If you don’t join this rat-race early enough, you have failed in society and you will be a burden on your parents. The kids are deprived of a life in order for them to gain enough “intelligence” to get into a top Indian college. Whereas after getting into these said colleges, they face challenges eventually because of their lack of exposure as a kid and the fact that they do not know how to socialise.

Meritocracy promotes merit, so what do the students do? They try to buy the merit. The parents especially are sold a dream that their kids will get into top IITs, NITs, AIIMS colleges, where they will graduate to earn millions. A very star studded dream, where the child will become the eventual support system. The wet dream of every middle class family.

There lies the first flaw, merit is for those who can afford it. If you cannot afford a private tutor or some coaching with lakhs in fees. I’m sorry, your child cannot succeed in life anymore.

The poor person cannot send their kid to college anymore because of the Savarna Bourgeoise and their attempts to make education even more merit based to establish their caste hegemony across Indian Education. If you cannot afford a private tutor, too bad that you are poor. The prominence of majority high caste students at top government institutions is a testament to the fact that the gap is huge and it is very real. Private tutoring, counsellings, English-Medium education and the luxury of being able to live in cities close enough to test centers that you can travel to them in cars are all that makes the Indian “equality” based education system so unique and surreal.

Coming back to the middle class, here lies the second flaw as they cannot afford private tutoring either. So they try the next best thing, that is to send their children into a hellhole dressed in a uniform, that forces them to live life the “JEE-way” or the “NEET-way”. Delhi, Kota, Pune, Mumbai and many other cities are factories that churn out these obedient workers from the middle classes. They do not care about anything except their exams, no social life, not much of anything exactly.

Finally the third (and most prominent) flaw, India is touted as being a society where “Skill” is rewarded but as soon as caste comes into play, everyone is ready to reinforce caste hegemony. Take an example of the Reservation Hatao Andolan (RHA). The amount of popularity it gained on the internet is absurd yet exactly shows how "caste" is still a concern for so many. It is genuinely funny to see how far people will go to justify how their caste has apparently been oppressed by the downtrodden who had been failed by the system over and over again, reservation giving them the only opportunity they can have. The conversation about inequality should be about the blatant corruption that lets people above the "Creamy-Layer" (which means that the people are fortunate enough, and don't need reservation) get the benefits they never really need/deserve.

Education in India sucks, hence the people find ways to blame things that have no relation with Education at all. Hence the attack on a try for equal opportunities in a country which does not care to give those out. But it isn't the people's fault entirely. They have been force fed a system that only rewards those with money and power. The system does not work for the less fortunate, or even the middle class. The system produces cogs that are just supposed to stay there. They don't create minds who think, they create minds who just do as they are told.

Studying for your class test? Mug the topic up. Worried about your school exam? Just ratta-fy the teacher's questions, they're gonna set the paper anyways. But if you want even more security, if you want more marks, just approach the teacher personally for private tutoring. Pay them thousands of extra rupees per month, then you are all set to become a topper... until someone comes and tests your actual critical thinking skills. And don't get me started on cheating and cheating scandals. AFAIK half of the Indians are banned from one thing or the other when it comes to actually using skill.

We, the people of India are told repeatedly that, if we work hard enough, we will achieve something. We will get some merit and that merit will help us become better in life. But that is completely wrong. No Merit ever helps us as we are doomed by corruptions, scandals, cheating and capitalist tendencies of institutions that should imprint the values of education inside of us, whether out disciplines may be Science, Humanities or Commerce. This is where we lack, this is why we will never understand and we will never overcome this illusion that looks like an oasis, but is farther from any reality we can ever be in.