Yesterday, I read with horror about a 16 year old girl who hanged herself to death. Officially the reason given is her parent’s refusal to allow her to go to friends place to join the kite flying celebrations. The parents just asked to her to focus on studies since she was in her crucial tenth grade.

There are so many such deaths across the country. Why this is different from others is that she was the classmate and friend of my daughter at school. Why should a girl just blooming in her life end herself for such a silly reason? Perhaps I may not understand this but is this really pressure on children to excel academically or was there any other reason?

What I am perplexed is the punishing ways of studies that kids are subjected to. Right from early morning till midnight, I can see a book in my daughter’s lap and one near the bed when she is fast asleep. We give no pressure to our children to succeed since I have no ambition to plan their career. I am of the belief they will have time and energy to plan a caree for themselves which I am sure will not be a doctor or engineer.

When we were in school failures came side by side to us. We never bothered for marks. We bothered to make friendship, stand by it and prolong it. This is the reason each one of my school friends are still in my circle. Many of us failed in many subjects and even lost precious years not able to jump to the next class for lack of marks. But not only our parents took it lightly but we made jokes out of it. Each one of these failed students are settled well and in fact earning well thant their contemporaries who excelled in their studies.

So the question is are we studying for a piece of paper? Are we studying to get admission to an obsolete course? Or are we studying for our broad outlook and to become humans in life?