Gentleman…

This was the first movie of director Shankar and still one of my favorites. It has an amazing screenplay and there are very little mistakes in the movie as such…

Was seeing this movie recently in TV and the movie actually makes more sense now. The crux of the movie is “education for all” and how education is being sold like pure business – only reachable to the rich. Today, if you need to get your kid admitted to L.K.G in one of the good schools in the city you first need to get your kid in to the play school run by the same school. And that is going to cost you 50K for 6 months. 50K for what? – the kid getting used to going school. And one of the parents need to accompany the kid during that time and the timings are some 9 – 12. 3 hours a day and 6 months you pay 50K? I remember my term fees – it was 1200 for 3 months. And I am talking about 12th Standard.

I don’t have the break up for all the classes from L.K.G till 12th standard, but if the kid spends L.K.G to 12th in the same school (the reputed one) you actually end up spending 23L – a straight 3.5L for 12th standard alone. I hear some strange stories wherein some schools in Mumbai have tieups with Adidas, Nike and all – the kid needs to wear only their shoes, t-shirts, caps, etc…

There can be an argument like it is only the case with reputed schools and not with every other school. If reputed school charges 50K, then normal schools would charge 35. And you don’t get access to good teachers and may be exposure in these normal schools. It is more like real estate – big builders charge premium, small builders charge less but compromise on quality. In all we don’t get what is worth the money.

I still don’t have a kid (not even married 🙂 ) to worry about all these…but things are bound to get worse in future… I still remember crying in front of my dad for getting that 400Rs for the school excursion. And I couldn’t go to one of the excursion because that 300 – 400 Rs was way to expensive. And I am talking about a decade back.