Everyone in Kashmir is after medical and engineering courses. But everyone can’t become a doctor or an engineer. It is time we shun this mindset and opt for skill-based courses for better future, urges Sayad Rashid Parrey.

Firstly, I congratulate all the students of Kashmir who passed their 10+2 examinations and are entering into college life. I am writing this article to convey a simple and plain message, which because of its simplicity, is ignored by almost all of us. We as human beings think deeply about our past and that is a basic instinct that distinguishes a wise from unwise. When we joined school as kids, it was a collective decision of our parents or guardians at that time. Luckily some of us got admission in Private or Montessori schools while many of us were admitted in ‘one teacher one class room’ government schools. But, don’t forget we all made it to the college life. Now, many of you will be strongly thinking of going with the medical or non-medical streams because your parents want you to do that, or you don’t want to hurt their sentiments. But, there will be many students who would be in a dilemma as to which way they should go. I have seen hundreds of unlucky students who take science subjects in one year and change it to arts or other non-science stream in the next because they don’t feel interested later. And it means the waste of one precious year in addition to stress on the student.
Education system and work culture in Kashmir is very different than that in the rest of the world. We have a vast and huge need of professionals and professionalism. We have only decision-seekers in Kashmir. But the need of the hour is to have decision-takers. Now that you have passed your 12th class examination it the right time to take a proper and careful decision about your future. Things are changing and every second counts. If you don’t want to become doctor or engineer but still go for medical or engineering coaching classes, then you are not doing any good to yourself. Rather you are just wasting your time, money and energy. The problem with us is we don’t have information about what is going around and what is the need of the hour or we simple don’t care about it. Due to this reason we lost an IIM and IIT to a Central University. Only 15% of Kashmiri students know that Management courses like MBA, PGDPM, PGPBM, and MBA-HM are more preferred courses in the world that too well ahead of MBBS. But, we still run after MBBS and waste time plus money that could have been utilized in some other important task. I am not trying to write that MBBS or engineering is not a good option but everyone can’t be a Doctor or Engineer. The MNC’s and Companies (Private or Public) that we want to see in Kashmir need Professionals with degrees like MBA, MCA, M-Tech, PGDPM, Commerce, Hospitality Management, Diploma holders in cloud computing, Web 3.0, 3G etc.
The reason for listing out these degrees is to inform all of you about the need of the hour. Kashmir educational system is on the verge of change. Many private colleges, B-schools and government established university campuses are coming up with innovative and competitive technical courses. In fact our most loved KU is also getting ready for competition. Once you take a step forward, you will love these courses or you can go outside Kashmir to get a future prospective degree. In Kashmir we have lot of Doctor’s Private Clinics and we don’t need any more of them. But, now we need offices of various MNC’s (Companies like Reliance, Infosys, and PepsiCo etc), finance and pharmaceutical companies, Ventures of Kashmiri entrepreneurs, IT and software companies and much more. And it only depends upon a right decision taken at the right time.

(Sayad Rashid Parrey is IT & Management Professional (IIBS Bangalore. Feedback at Sayad_S19@Rediffmail.com or Friend_of_PrettyAngel@yahoo.co.in)

Lastupdate on : Tue, 6 Apr 2010 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Tue, 6 Apr 2010 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Wed, 7 Apr 2010 00:00:00 IST