Yesterday, I finished all three seasons of Kota Factory. It is an amazing series and I must congratulate the director, actors, and all the crew members for coming out with such a beautiful portrayal of the stress that students go through while preparing for the competitive exams. I could relate quite a lot with my preparation for civil services. In fact, of late OTT came out with the series titled Aspirants and that was also quite commendable in bringing out the stress that students go through during the preparation for civil services. However, that was more focused on nuances of friendship and politics after the hero of the series became DM.
The key highlight of Kota Factory is Jeetu Bhaia. He is an IITian who turns a teacher of Physics. On the one hand, he is the best teacher of Physics because of his teaching style and on the other hand, he takes personal responsibility for each of the students studying with him. He solves their personal problems. In fact, he seems to have solutions for almost every problem kids face during preparation, probably due to his experience and willingness to solve the problems. If somebody has problems adjusting to the city, he provides him a solution in the form of 21 days of firm determination and in 21 days kids get adjusted to the city. He is the love guru solving the problems of the kids with their boyfriends and girlfriends. If somebody has a financial problem, he is willing to help the student financially despite his own financial problems and borrowings. He helps kids when they fall ill. He keeps motivating them, whenever they are psychologically down due to the heavy pressure of examination. In all, he takes responsibility for the kids.
The low point in his journey comes when he motivates one of the girls to prepare for the JEE Advanced while she is not at all confident to prepare and wants to exit after clearing the JEE Mains. She fails and commits suicide and Jeetu Bhaiya starts holding himself accountable for the same and due to that, he is unable to teach the kids. He passes through a phase of depression and has to be on medicines for some time. After that his behavior changes and he gets stressed when kids discuss their personal problems with him or when parents start blaming him for not taking care of their kids.
I was just wondering whether there is any relation between the stress that Vaibhav, Meena, and other kids take to clear the examination and the stress that occurs to Jeetu Bhaiya for not having counseled that girl who committed suicide. I see a correlation there. Kids are stressed because their parents have sent them with a lot of expectations and they somehow want to fulfill the expectations. Some of them have huge dreams or aims, as Jeetu Bhaiya calls them, to get selected for IIT. All the kids would have imagined themselves being in IIT and living a happy life thereafter. In fact, that is what Jeetu Bhaia tells Meena when he undertakes teaching to earn some money due to the financial problems that after getting into IIT, he would be able to spend tens of thousands just like that and advises him not to waste time to earn money and borrow from his friends keeping the self-respect aside. All the kids are made to believe that IIT or no IIT makes a hell lot of difference to lives as if the entire purpose of life is over once somebody gets selected to IITs.
Isn't that a too narrow view of life? There is no doubt that IIT is one of the premier institutes in India and it is a privilege to get education from the Institute. It is also quite sure that the average package of IITians is far higher than the average package of other institutes. However, is life all about package and technical education. I feel that there are there are few things happening here. First, parents have either not been able to fulfill their own desires of earning money and use their kids as a tool to fulfill their unfulfilled desires, or they have earned money and developed a deep attachment with that money and attached sensual gratification, and feel that their kids shall get the same. Second, there is great disregard for the wideness of life and the entire meaning of life in the minds of parents revolves around the job and career. That is such a unidimensional view of life. Third, the fact that each kid has a different temperament and natural inclination is completely disregarded by the parents. Fourth, and most importantly, the kids are unduly influenced by their parents at a very tender age much before the kids have developed enough wisdom to understand themselves and the purpose of their lives.
Life is a process. Will the kids not face challenges in life after clearing IIT? Will they not have health issues, troubles in relationships, difficult marriages, and moral conflicts? Will the fat pay package after IIT make life easy in all respects? Definitely not. Since the parents fail to give the right perspective to the kids, they feel as if it is life and death situation. That is the reason why a student, after failing the examination, feels as if life has no meaning because the parents have told her explicitly or implicitly that there is no meaning in life without IIT. The same narrow worldview gets confirmed and repeated by the mean coaching institutes that work just for turnover and profit and have nothing to do with the lives of the students. As parents, we need to introspect as to what are we doing with our kids. We have provided them with such a narrow perspective of life that they will always remain losers. If they fail, they are prone to taking extreme steps like suicide and definitely will always carry a scar of being a failure. If they succeed, they will grow arrogant and develop a superiority complex which will take so many colors out of their lives and make their relationships in the family and at the workplace quite difficult. We see a few shades of such difficulties in Jeetu Bhaiya when he fights with his colleagues in the coaching center he has started.
When we lose the larger perspective of life, we set our life goals around something quite narrow. That is what Jeetu Bhaiya has done. He is trying to become accountable for the kids. He wants to become Bhaiya who has a crucial role in the selection of his students for the IIT. He fails to realize the difference between responsibility and accountability. We may be responsible for somebody as we would like to respond as and when that person needs us. However, we can never be accountable for the other person. Everybody has to be accountable for his own decisions. That is what Jeetu Bhaiya learns from his experiences after two rounds of psychological treatment, and while counseling Vaibhav, when he fails to clear the JEE Advanced when all his friends clear the exam. He says that everybody has to make his own decision. Teachers and parents can only assure the kids that we will always be responsible and keep supporting them. However, since every kid would be accountable for his actions, and bear the consequences, they have to make their own decisions. No parent like Jeetu Bhai can hold himself accountable for the fate of the kids, and that is why it is just and fair that kids are allowed the freedom to make their own choices. Parents can at best enable them to make informed choices.
I feel that life is an opportunity provided by the divine for us to grow as a human being. We get fixated on a very limited possibility thereof, like parents and kids getting fixated on a particular career option, or Jeetu Bhaiya getting fixated on making each of the kids successful in JEE Advanced. As our perspective becomes limited, we start living a life of extremes. Extreme stress with the apprehension of failure to achieve the goal, extreme frustration, and depression when we actually fail, an extreme pleasure that soon results in arrogance when we achieve the goal, and missing on so many possibilities of life. There is no doubt that focus is the key to success, but before being focused on an aim, we have to look around to see how the aim we are fixing fits into our lives. If that fits into the meaning of our life, then there would be no stress because we will enjoy the process. If we enjoy the process, anyhow our chances to get the outcome increase manifold. On the other hand, when we focus on the outcome, our attention drifts away from the process and chances of getting the outcome are reduced. I have not prepared for IIT Advanced but have prepared for Civil Services and can say with certainty that any and everybody who cracked the Civil Services Examination enjoyed the process of learning and when we talk to each other, we remember that phase very fondly. JEE or Civil Services is just a phase and not the end of life. Once we start enjoying the process, it does not matter whether we get selected for IIT or Civil Services, we will always be happy in our lives because happiness comes with that inner connection that allows us to take joy in the process.
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