Lieutenant-Governor of DelhiTaranjit Singh Sandhu, recently, while addressing an agenda-setting meeting with vice-chancellors and heads of higher educational institutions in the national capital, observed that nearly three lakh students across these institutions could serve as “ambassadors” of sustainable practices. The thought is based on perception that Universities and colleges are among the most influential spaces for nurturing civic values and social responsibility.
The model suggested by the Lieutenant-Governor is rooted in a robust classroom engagement. It assumes an active academic culture where teachers teach, students attend, ideas are exchanged and values are cultivated through sustained interaction. The problem lies not in the vision but in the realities of implementation.
A serious survey of higher educational institutions across Delhi would reveal not merely concerns about the quality of classroom engagement but even its quantity. Absenteeism has become a persistent and often ignored challenge across institutions in both the government and self-financed sectors.
Officially, however, one may find little evidence of such a crisis. Records would show attendance of both students and teachers. Regulations of the University Grants Commission mandate that only students with at least 75 percent attendance are permitted to sit for semester examinations. Consequently, data would also show very few instances of students being debarred for lack of attendance.
But numbers can often conceal realities. Walk into many institutions unannounced during regular class hours and the picture would be markedly different. Empty classrooms are not uncommon sights. Attendance registers could indicate otherwise, but lived realities would frequently contradict official records.
The problem is not merely administrative but also cultural. Discipline in several institutions appears to have weakened over the years. Many teachers avoid enforcing attendance and academic standards, unwilling to risk confrontation over poor attendance, incomplete assignments or weak performance. The cost of maintaining discipline often outweighs the incentives.
In self-financed institutions, another pressure operates simultaneously. These institutions survive on the basis of maintaining an image of compliance and quality assurance. Any indication of widespread absenteeism or poor academic engagement can adversely affect institutional reputation and regulatory evaluations. Under such circumstances, addressing the problem becomes more difficult than masking it.
The result is a familiar tendency: managing data rather than problems. It mirrors a common criticism of crime administration, where projecting a crime-free environment may depend less on reducing crime than on reducing its reporting.
Similarly, educational institutions may present impressive attendance figures, student participation and sustainability initiatives. Reports may project an ideal environment, but data on paper does not always reflect campus realities.
The concern goes beyond attendance. At stake is the quality of graduates being produced. Across the country, there is growing concern over
“uneducated graduates”— degree holders who lack critical thinking, analytical skills, social awareness and meaningful engagement with knowledge.
It is perhaps within such conditions that unusual social and political spectacles gain traction. The popularity of movements such as the Cockroach Janata Party phenomenon on social media, for instance, can also be read as an expression of a wider societal frustration, particularly among sections of youth who find themselves educated in form but not in substance. The issue, therefore, is not one of sustainability campaigns versus educational reform. Both can coexist. However, one cannot be built effectively without the other.
If the Lieutenant-Governor wants genuine ambassadors of sustainability, he must focus on restoring classroom discipline, attendance, academic integrity and respect for teaching in higher education institutions.
Sustainability ultimately begins with institutions that sustain themselves. Similarly, education can sustain society only when the classroom ceases to become an empty formality and become the centre of learning
This story is reported by Sidharth Mishra
