Tradition has given importance to certain roles in one’s life journey. At the top comes the mother and father, ‘matru devo bhava’ and ‘pitru devo bhava’ as they are known respectively. Next, importance is given to ‘acharya’, the teacher. Here the acharya is much beyond one who makes one ‘literate’. Here the role is mentor, guide, and formal teacher. Acharya assumes the next important position to one’s parents.
The recent celebration of Teachers' Day, the birthday of teacher-turned-President Dr S Radhakrishnan, allowed us to reflect on the role of teachers in one’s life and society. In the traditional gurukul education system, acharya was the whole and sole in one’s life during twelve years’ stay. Typical ‘admission’ would happen by the age of eight and subsequent years would go towards acquiring the elementary and madhyama levels, and then comes the specialisation. The acharya plays a critical role in all these.
Till recently the higher learning institutions embedded in tradition were awarding ‘Shastri’ as the undergraduate degree and ‘Acharya’ as the postgraduate degree. Implicit is also the understanding that one who acquires the higher level shall take up the profession of ‘acharya’ and prepare the next generations. Additionally, before the compulsive pursuit of doctorates, the master’s degree was sufficient to reach the ‘acharya’ level, that is professor level in the modern university setup.
Only a holistic educational system can prepare holistic individuals. For society to reap the benefits of knowledge, it has to prime its educational system. From a deficiency mindset, it has to move towards an empowered mindset. Inferiority-driven curriculum mastery should move towards a self-respecting, vigour-driven, locally relevant ideas-propelled education system. The acharya has to be one who has mastered the eco-system and who can connect academic learning with practice. The acharya has to offer guidance along ‘tamasoma jyotirgamaya’, taking pupils from darkness to the light.
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True education is enlightenment and liberation. Unless the acharya is equipped well with theoretical and practical aspects of one’s branch of learning, it is difficult to guide the keenly awaiting minds. For this to happen, the nation has to prioritise education, society has to respect teachers, and teachers have to be at their best. A sustainable future, then, is around the corner, when society is values-driven and knowledge-respecting.
Dr S Ainavolu is a professor at VPSoM, DYPU, Navi Mumbai. Views are personal. You can read more at https://www.ainavolu.in/blog
