2021 was a great year for India in terms of foreign recognition. We won several medals in the Olympics and Paralympics, PM NarendraModi topped the global leaders’ list in terms of approval rating, Harnaaz Sandhu made India proud by winning the Miss Universe title after 21 years and Parag Agrawal became the CEO of Twitter. While the whole country is proud of them, some people just cannot leave to troll these personalities. Recently someone trolled Harnaaz Sandhu that she won the title because she has a pretty face. To which she replied, “Winning a beauty pageant requires as much effort as winning an Olympic medal”. True indeed. Usain Bolt trained for 20 years just to run those 2 minutes. So we can’t compare anything with how hard it is to win an Olympic medal. But are the efforts given on studies is underrated?
On average, a student gives his life’s 22 years for the studies (way more than the time someone gives for any other field). But the reward that he gets is never appreciated. The people who can appreciate their results are either the family members, relatives, friends, or at max, their community. Suppose a student completed his graduation from Mumbai University, he was not satisfied with his education. He applied for online transcripts, received the required documents like Mumbai University transcript, ECA, visa, MoI, etc., and studied abroad. He got a nice job there and settled abroad. He is Suresh Pithania. Do you know him? No, right? Nobody knows him. It’s just an imaginary character but millions like him gave all their life but still didn’t get the recognition they deserve. Why? There are many reasons why a person doesn’t become a celebrity despite giving all his efforts. Let’s discuss why the efforts put into studies are underrated.
Firstly, in this world, celebrities belong to very specific categories i.e. actors, sportsperson, politicians, businessmen, and a few others. These fields are considered to be glamorous fields and everyone is attracted to glamour. Therefore once a person becomes a known figure in these fields, their efforts are automatically recognized. No one knew Neeraj Chopra before he won the gold medal in Olympics. But after his winning, all his background came in the limelight that he belongs to the army, he trained hard for 7 years, etc., etc. Similarly, the followers in Harnaaz Sandhu’s Instagram account jumped from 300K to 3M. Moreover, media plays an important role in deciding whom to make famous and whom not to. Since the highest achievement after getting highly educated doesn’t fall in these categories, the efforts put in education are not considered much.
Secondly, there are highly educated social workers, scientists, young entrepreneurs, economists, judges, etc. about whom today’s youth might have no idea. They are the people shaping our nation. Their hard work behind the camera is working for the betterment of the country. Their efforts in their fields cannot be compared with anything. Do you know RaghuramRajan? He might have gone through the same process to go and study abroad. He completed graduation, and just like any other students procuring Mumbai University Transcript, DU Transcript, etc. he also processed his required documents, went abroad and completed his masters, and later became one of the most successful RBI governors of India. But does any media ever broadcasted how much effort he has given in his life to become such a successful person? No. Because his field was not as glamorous as actors according to the media.
In this era of smartphones and the internet, we can see parents encouraging their children to sing, dance, make videos, etc. but they don’t want them to send their children to these fields. On the other hand, we can see parents want their children to become successful employees, businessmen, scientists, etc. but they don’t teach them how to build, repair, create or innovate. So their desires and efforts just don’t match. The whole responsibility of making a child successful has been left to their school and tuitions. Even student achieves something extraordinary, it’s the school and coaching center that gets the credit. So where can the efforts of students be recognized? What do you think – how can we recognize the efforts of students?
