Commercialisation of education

A country without guaranteeing access to education for all can’t ensure democracy in the real sense of the word. Democracy doesn’t necessarily be interpreted as the way of only voting someone to power. If one can’t judge one never knows how judiciously he can use his right to vote because without proper education it is never possible for someone to do it.

And this is one of the major reasons why we see people voting for the wrong man to power resulting in disaster for that person and others as well. In most cases, educated people also make the same mistake because of a lack of proper education. Let alone higher education, children of our country are deprived even of their primary education. When a government should through a long and arduous process tries to ensure education for all, in our country the right to education is gradually being taken away.

A good number of private schools, colleges and universities are now meeting the growing demand for education. Whatever the government educational institutions are still left, they are too getting expensive depriving people of their rights to education. According to a circular published on the website of the medical education wing of the Health Ministry on February 21, the government increased the admission fees for undergraduate medical courses in private medical and dental colleges by 17 per cent.

Undoubtedly it is a very big rise in the fees for undergraduate medical courses. After the increase, each admission-seeking student now will have to pay Tk19.44 lakh in place of Tk16.20 lakh. It is a staggering rise of Tk3.24 lakh. Will the students from the middle and lower middle classes afford to pay this fat amount of money for their education? Even before the increase, the amount was beyond the capacity of those classes. No, it is going to be almost out of their reach.

Educationists in our country have already reportedly denounced the decision to hike the admission fees by the government. They think most of the people of our country are not able to bear the expense of their medical education. It will straightforwardly hit the students from villages hard shattering their dreams of studying at medical educational institutions despite their being meritorious.

It should be mentioned here that the scope for medical education for financially weak students is very slim in South Asian countries as most of the medical colleges are private ones. Now it is going to get slimmer if the decision, according to the government, is carried out from the next academic year. We are anxious about the way the entire education system is being commercialized.

It will be suicidal on the part of the government to let education become a product that can be sold and bought by those who have money as it will eventually lead the nation to be like a man without a head. The conception of selling education and buying it by those who have money will produce a group of people who will want to invest in their education for individual purposes. They will never be able to inculcate a culture of lofty values and dignity.

If this happens and the entire education system is commercialized we are going to be deprived of the talents latent in the meritorious students who never can afford to have access to higher education. The government in this regard should rethink about the decision before it goes for its implementation.