Aug 22, 2010
“I was born intelligent but education ruined me”. This one-liner was uttered by none other than famous scientist Albert Einstein and people seem to have taken a fancy to this considering the present system of education in our country. I saw this funky graffiti in bold attractive letters on the T’s worn by many carefree young guys and girls and they seem to be flaunting it with carefree gusto. In today’s changing world when educated people resort to all sorts of crimes including ghastly murders of their spouses and children, this statement calls for little more thought and action as it reflects the society we live in. This is because social environment with weak or broken family bonds is said to be the catalyst to criminal behavior and what we are witnessing is an element of the same.
Generally it is believed that education broadens a person’s perspective on a variety of issues including treating other people with respect and getting the same from others. Not long ago crime was usually considered to be the domain of the uneducated, school drop outs or that of bad elements that did not have much education. A spate of killings in Karnataka in the last few years, by well qualified men and women who held well-paid jobs, is a matter of grave concern to all and it calls for urgent attention. Some of these murders are most gruesome, making us wonder how these well educated people could commit such gruesome acts.
Just last week people of Karnataka were shell-shocked to read and hear about the ghastly murder of his own wife Priyanka, a Delhi Public School teacher, by a senior employee of Infosys Technologies Satish Kumar Gupta. Her throat was slit and her hands and legs tied to the chair and Satish Kumar Gupta has confessed to the murder of his wife Priyanka. In July this year a woman lawyer was stabbed to death by her male colleague in the High Court premises in broad day light.
Who can forget the Bank Manager killing his own two little innocent children and his mother-in-law and sister-in-law in Putter just a couple of months back? Just in July people were reminded of the murder committed by a young and beautiful advocate Shubha when the fast track court sentenced her and her paramour for life for the murder of her fiancé Girish. Shubha, who was just 21 in December 2003 when the crime was committed had murdered Girish within four days of getting engaged to Girish. Girish, an innocent, paid a heavy price that too with his life for no fault of his.
Though the incident had occurred in 2003 people got a glimpse of Shubha, whose age, appearance and demeanor belied that she could plot such a heinous crime. With Girish’s father dying an untimely death following the death of his son in such a gruesome manner, Shubha is also guilty of double murders.
In March this year Ekanath Pai, an Airport Authority of India (AAI) employee was arrested on charges of killing his wife Ajitha in Mumbai, also an AAI employee. The incident occurred in Mumbau. But Eknath Pai hails from Bajpe and the couple had worked in Mangalore airport for many years before going on a transfer to Mumbai a few years back. The couple had well paid jobs and their only daughter was studying in Manipal. It is said that the strained relationship between the couple could have been the cause that resulted in Ajitha’s murder. To go back a little, in 2008, another techie Budhiraj, also an employee of Infosys had killed his Chartered Accountant wife Rinku Sachdev, suspecting her of having an affair and he too had committed suicide.
Women were the victims in most of the incidents mentioned above except in Shubha’s case. All the above cited incidents are related to relationships in one way or the other indicating the weak fabric of family bonds which are dwindling or disappearing at an alarming rate. When law gives enough opportunities for couples to separate and lead their own lives one wonders why these educated people choose the wrong path and jeopardize others as well as their own lives!
True, sometimes relationships don’t work between couples for various reasons and the fault may lie in one of the partners or in both. But that does not mean one has to physically eliminate the partner either in a momentary anger or through meticulous planning as was done by Shubha. Even Sathish Gupta seems to have planned Priyanka’s murder over a period of time. The fact that these educated professionals could think and sustain such thoughts of murder shows the decadence of the social and family values in our country. Nuclear families with lack of family support, Withering family ties, greed, selfishness and lack of respect for other’s lives, has brought us to the present state.
Our parents and grandparents who were not much educated were better than us when it comes to human relationships. They had respect for others and concern for their family members and led a peaceful and contented life, though they lacked the comforts and luxuries of modern day life. Education and well paid jobs might have brought us all those comforts we were aspiring for. But they have taken away our sleep, peace of mind, the humaneness from our relationships, the concern and empathy for fellow human beings. It has brought nothing but misery, stress and a host of modern diseases.
It is not enough if people are educated. True education is one that broadens the thoughts, outlook, that which brings about behavioral changes in a person and when we come to accept and respect others, their religion and their way of life. “Live and let live” should be the policy. Hatred and criminal behavior stems from a wicked mind. It is not enough if we are educated by reading what is being taught in schools curriculum. We should be learned and broaden our horizon by reading and through the experience we gain from life.