PLEASE, I am begging you. READ THIS.
Karan Thapar: One way forward would be to increase the total number of seats.
Arjun Singh: Yes, definitely.
Karan Thapar: But the problem is that, as the Times of India points out, we are talking of an increase of perhaps as much as 53 per cent. Given the constraints you have in terms
of faculty and infrastructure, won't that order of increase dilute the quality of education?
Arjun Singh: I would only make one humble request, don't go by The Times of India and The Hindustan Times about faculty and infrastructure, because they are trying to focus on an argument which they have made.
Karan Thapar: All right, I will not go by The Times of India, let me instead go by Sukhdev Thorat, the Chairman of the UGC. He points out that today, at higher education levels - that is all universities, IITs and IIMs - there is already a 1.2 lakh vacancy number. Forty per cent of these are in teaching staff, which the IIT faculty themselves point out that they have shortages of up to 30 per cent. Given those two constraint, can you increase the number of seats?
Arjun Singh: That can be addressed and that shortage can be taken care of.
Karan Thapar: But it can't be taken care of in one swoop, it will take several years to do it.
Arjun Singh: I don't know whether it can be taken care of straightway or in stages, that is a subject to be decided.
Karan Thapar: Let me ask you bluntly, if you were to agree to compensate for reservations for OBCs by increasing the number of seats, would that increase happen at one go, or would it be staggered over a period of two-three or four year old process.
Arjun Singh: As I told you, it is an issue that I cannot comment upon at this moment because that is under examination.
Karan Thapar: So, it may happen in one go and it may happen in a series of several years.
Arjun Singh: I can't speculate on that because that is not something on which I am free to speak on today.
Karan Thapar: Will the reservation for OBCs, whatever figure your Committee decides on, will it happen in one go, or will it slowly be introduced in stages?
Arjun Singh: That also I cannot say because, as I told you, all these issues are under consideration.
Karan Thapar: Which means that everything that is of germane interest to the people concerned is at the moment 'under consideration' and the government is not able to give any satisfaction to the students who are deeply concerned.
Arjun Singh: That is not the point. The government knows what to do and it will do what is needed.
Karan Thapar: But if the government knows what to do, why won't you tell me what the government wants to do?
Arjun Singh: Because unless the decision is taken, I cannot tell you.
Karan Thapar: But you can share with me as the minister what you are thinking.
Arjun Singh: No.
Karan Thapar: So, in other words, we are manitaining a veil of secrecy and the very people who are concerned...
Arjun Singh: I am not maintaining a veil of secrecy. I am only telling you what propriety allows me to tell you.
Karan Thapar: Propriety does not allow you to share with the people who are protesting on the streets what you are thinking of?
Arjun Singh: I don't think that that can happen all the time.
Karan Thapar: But there are people who feel that their lives and their futures are at stake and they are undertaking fasts until death.
Arjun Singh: It is being hyped up, I don't want to go into that.
Karan Thapar: Do you have no sympathy for them?
Arjun Singh: I have every sympathy.
Karan Thapar: But you say it is being hyped up.
Arjun Singh: Yes, it is hyped up.
Karan Thapar: So, then, what sympathy are you showing?
Arjun Singh: I am showing sympathy to them and not to those who are hyping it up.
Karan Thapar: For seven weeks, they have been protesting in the hot sun. No minister has gone there to appease them, to allay their concerns, to express sympathy for them. Have politicians let the young people of India down?
Arjun Singh: Well, I myself called them. They all came in this very room.
Karan Thapar: But you are the only one.
Arjun Singh: You are accusing me only. No one else is being accused.
Karan Thapar: What about the Government of India? Has the Government of India failed to respond adequately?
Arjun Singh: From the Government of India also, the Defence Minister met them.
Karan Thapar: Only recently.
Arjun Singh: That is something because everyone was busy with the elections.
Karan Thapar: For seven weeks no one met them.
Arjun Singh: No, but we are very concerned. Certainly, all of us resent the kind of force that was used. I condemned it the very first day it happened.
Karan Thapar: All right, Mr Arjun Singh. We have reached the end of this interview. Thank you very much for speaking on the subject.
Someone please explain him to me. Is it just me or is this mentally unstable moron the biggest loser known to mankind. PLEASE someone go kill him, he’s wasting the oxygen on this planet. Whose brilliant idea was it to bring him to this planet? Kill his parents first (i.e. if they are still alive after giving birth to and raising the biggest wimp EVER)
GO read the whole thing at
http://www.ibnlive.com/news/decision-on-quota-is-final-arjun/11063-4-single.html