Do I blame my parents
For enforcing academics on me?
No, they were victims
Of the same narrow path
That the whole of society
Has been forced through.
They recognised the evil
Yet knew they were too powerless
To save their loved one from it
And hence pushed her into the waterfall
To flow with it, as it is less painful
And difficult than going against.
Do I blame the hellhole coaching centres
That thrust education down our throats
Taking something appealing (even tantalising!)
And giving it the most bitter coating
As they did so?
No, they made it rote
But at least they increased the quality
Of each crop of students
Widened our horizons
And taught us MORE
Than one would learn twenty years ago
In the end, they create
More knowledgeable young adults.
Do I blame the friend
Who the meaning of competition
A bit too seriously, misleading me,
Turning into a liar as she achieves her goals
No, she's just a victim of
This society's gruesome fangs
Developing a set of her own,
She perpetrates the crime
Using ulterior motives, and cunning means
To eliminate competition.
On purpose, she crushes my spirit
But can she kill the zeal
Of the lakhs that remain in her way?
Do I blame the teacher
That draws an insensitive comparison
Between the dimwit I am
To the intelligence of the other?
No, all she tries to do is
Use shame as a motivational tool.
She is a well wisher;
She sees me as her own.
She does it because as her student
She would like for me to be better
Than I am today.
Do I blame the person
Who shows unrepentant arrogance
For scoring better than me?
No, he doesn't know
The humbling taste of failure.
He thinks he single-handedly conquered
The most important aspect of life;
He doesn't know that he doesn't control
Everything that orchestrates
His grand success.
Do I blame the people
Who disregarded my existence
When I failed that one time
No, they don't know the first thing
About neither my failure
Nor my success
These are minds that have been trained
To see life as an array
Of meaningless numbers
Or as black or white
No grey in between.
Do I blame the strangers
Whose behavior turns a full flip
When they know I'm a doctor?
No, I blame the generations
Of misunderstanding of achievement,
Ignoring the role of luck and good fortune
The access to opportunities
And the triggers to early realisation
Of what life is all about;
That maturity that genetically sets in
At an earlier time than others.
Don't they all know? That everyone tries
To be the best that they can?
I blame this generation,
For perpetrating the norms
Set down by ancestors
I blame the ones who know better
Yet don't educate their children
To the point of minimum sensibleness
And thereby ruin this nation
Along with the people who fail to meet
Their hypocritical expectations.
I blame the system
For no direction being pointed
To one with no background
Nepotism exists in every field
Lack of guidance is abundant
For no one takes you under their wing
Unless related by blood
And points you right from wrong.
No one shows you what shall happen
If you don't do what you should
And more heart wrenching is,
No one shows you what it is you should.
At the end there's a line of mentors
Waiting, eagerly, to see you fall
Trip on your own oversized degree
Whose time is up to achieve
But yet you hardly fill into.
They laugh and point, sneering oddly.
Ultimately they label some as a failure
For the failure that truly is their own.
I blame this system,
For no standardisation of result.
Does a single exam's score
Determine even a portion of my worth?
No one got to know me,
No one spoke and assessed my mentality.
There's no holistic understanding
Of the person that is selected.
That being the least of our problems--
There is no entity to keep in check
The aspirants that give payment for good result
And the authorities that use illegal means
In order to get corrupt payment.
There's no one to overlook
If everyone gets what they deserve.
There's no one concerned
About the role of chance factors
In something that changes the course
Of one's entire life.
Who is looking out to see
How a student performs every week,
Every day, every night, every hour?
Education ought to be
A state of mind, A way to live
An imbibed habit, that transforms a person.
An educated person ought not be
The same as one
Who throws his rubbish on the street!
It is not the preparation to crack
A single mindless exam
Or to satisfy "reputed" old officials
Who care more about the dress you wear
How neatly you comb your hair
The apparent traditions you follow
The tone with which you wish them
Whether you save their own ego
At a moment of their error
Rather than the knowledge you've built
Inside your head with years
Of hard work and grovel.
Need I be concerned
About the neatness of my margins?
Should I worry of the examiner's mood
While correcting my very paper,
What if he has a quarrel with his wife?
Is my future at stake?
I blame the system,
So twisted and intricate
Just waiting for competent candidates
To fall through the crude loopholes;
To filter them out based on chance events And randomly chosen qualities
That they never had to procure for the job.
