I am here to plead for an emergency rescue plan for the students of classes 9, 10, 11 and 12.Kiran Bedi announced while speaking as part of a panel debating on ‘How to train students for innovation and leadership’ at the Conclave. And why do we need a rescue plan? To stop our youth from becoming anti-nationals, she explained, “Students must immediately come into an emergency rescue program because in the next three years, they will become voters and demanding jobs,” adding, “I sometimes wonder where they will go, I hear that they will go and become rowdies. They find power through these routes to buy themselves a (political) position, which is what they are aspiring for.”
Speaking alongside IIM-B’s Rajeev Srinivasan and IMI’s Debashis Chatterjee, she explained her ‘rescue plan’: “The first step would be an immediate training programme for 11th and 12th standard teachers. They should sit together with parents and principals to decide what becomes of these students. Secondly, we need to create an ecosystem where they will either go to college or to a polytechnic institute. Without a steady plan, they will not make it to universities, engineering or anything.”
Bedi also pointed out challenges of the national education plan and called for an immediate implementation of structural changes.Rajeev Srinivasan, Adjunct faculty, IIM-B and Debashis Chatterjee, DG, International Management Institute said bringing back the gurukul system might be an appropriate solution.