Oldest College and Universities in India!!

India is the oldest country known for its values, Heritage and educational capabilities. In ancient times, scholars from all around the world used to came to India to get the education which will enable them to live a happy and peaceful life.

At that time there were many Universities and GuruKul which used to be famous amongst world scholar and it was very difficult to get admission into those. In modern India we have several universities and colleges carrying heritage of their golden years and still attract students from within and outside India.

These colleges and Universities are almost 2 centuries old but the way they are functioning right now, we can easily say that they are there for many centuries to come.

SeramPore College:

Founded in 1818 by William Carey, Joshua Marshman and William ward in Howrah, West Bengal. This college churns out many graduates every year. Aim of this college to give the knowledge of arts and science to the students of all caste creed and color.

Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee

Established in 1847, formerly the name of this college is University of Roorkee and Thomason College of Civil Engineering. It was not an IIT before but due to its rich heritage this is one of the first few IIT’s of our country.

University of Mumbai

Established in 1857, the oldest campus of this university is in South Mumbai.  This university modelled on University of London. Its first degree got awarded in 1862 and it was for bachelor in arts. Also it was one of the first 3 state universities.

University of Madras

Established in 1857, this is the second university in the trio of state universities.  This is the 5^th ranked university in 2011 by India today’s magazine. It has 6 campuses in the city.

University of Calcutta

Established in 1857, this is the third university in the trio of state universities. UGC recently gave 5 stars to this University. It has 4 Nobel laureates which includes, Rabindranath Tagore, Amartya Sen, C V Raman and Ronald ross.

Aligarh University

Established in 1875 by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan and has one of the largest campus of 465 hectare in India. It offers more the 300 various courses in different streams.

These are some of the oldest colleges available in India and still educating thousands of Scholars every year. It shows what rich culture and heritage we have in our country.

Raju fir bhi banega Gentleman...So what if he don't know English??

So we all studied in English medium school and we are proud of that. Some of us are convent educated and some of us were from some really good private schools which gives good emphasis on English. It’s very common to hear nowadays when children’s speaking to each other in Hindi and parent’s telling them “Why are you talking in Hindi? Did we send you to an English Medium school to Speak in Hindi? You are wasting your parent’s money?” Even many parents want’s their children to learn A for Apple first rather than any other language.

According to the latest data by National University of Education, Planning and Administration (NUEPA) there is 274% increase in the no of students studying in English schools between 2003 & 2011. Now, if you want to get a Job so knowing English is almost necessary everywhere. So parents are linking English language knowledge to their wards official and personal growth.

People feel embarrassed when they are not able to speak English and even we always had a good laugh when we heard someone speaking incorrect English. People speak loudly in English in public places to create an impression or become the center of attraction or sometimes they don’t speak at all because of lack of English language skills. So knowing English is important for social status now? Or Speaking in Hindi language is matter of shame for us now?

India has myriad of Language like Hindi, Tamil, Sanskrit, Malayalam etc. and it’s difficult to choose official language and each language has a rich history and culture behind them. So why one don’t want to choose any one of them? In a staggering data given by People linguistic survey by India, out 780 language 220 languages has already been lost in last 50 years.

Students who are studying in local languages got demotivated by society and sometimes by near and dear ones. They feel rejected everywhere. They can’t see themselves adding any value to the Indian ecosystem. All of important examinations like IIT JEE or UPSC etc. has adopted English as the primary language of communication and because of this many local language speaking students not even try for these examinations.

English is seriously becoming our primary language and we think it’s important for us to grow as a nation as well. In this way we can integrate ourselves to the western world and speed up our growth. That’s why we are choosing French and German instead of Sanskrit. Well many of you may not know that many words in English have taken from Sanskrit like Mother and Brother from MATR and BHRATA. If we have to learn something from our neighbor then we should learn from China. That country is miles ahead of us in every department and ENGLISH IS NOT THEIR PRIMARY LANGUAGE.

You want to stand in a world forum and you want to communicate globally then yes knowing English is important. But it doesn’t mean that you forget your identity and knowing your language and speaking in it is a matter of pride. Learn from Japanese they are so proud of their language and if English is so important then their country might not be functional today. Many Russian players speaking in Russian in major sports event and other countries reporters make the effort to understand them. Then why we can’t speak in our local language? Let the world make an effort to understand that.

Movies reflecting the eternal beauty of Teacher-Student relationship

Movies are the mirror of our society. Movies reflect all type of relationships and all type of emotions in entertaining way. Relationship between teacher and student is also one of them. Many movies portrayed varied emotions between teacher and students. So today we are going to have a look on some of the memorable movies which is considered to be a milestone in Hindi cinema. These movies inspired us and imparted moral values in us.

Abhi Bhattacharya played a boarding school teacher who instills moral values by unorthodox teaching methods and also helped a spoilt rich kid to get the right direction in his life. A must watch for lovers of Indian cinema classics. It also has a famous song “AAO BACHE TUMHE DIKHAYEIN”.

Jeetendra played a music teacher who goes to Rai sahib bungalow to give education to kids. He uses music and games to give them education and helps them to reconcile with their grandparents. This movie boasts of some melodious songs including very famous “MUSAFIR HOON YAARON”.

Nasseruddin Shah terrific portrayal of a drunkard ex cricketer who helped a deaf and mute boy to achieve his dreams to play for Indian team make this movie memorable one and must watch.

Amitabh Bachhan played a teacher and mentor to a girl who can’t see and speak and helped her to get all the obstacles of life. Performances from Amitabh Bachhan and Rani Mukherjee made this movie a milestone in Hindi cinema. The highest point of the movie was a kissing scene between teacher and student.

Aamir khan played a teacher who helped a dyslexic child to gain his self- confidence and helps him to get into mainstream world. Darsheel Safary portrayal of a Dyslexic child won him accolades and made this movie memorable.

Shahrukh Khan played a coach who helps girls in Indian hockey team to forget their individual differences, play with unity and to come on top by winning Hockey world cup. Shahrukh khan memorable performance made this movie one of the most successful movies of Indian cinema.

So guys do not miss these movies as these movies reflect the true value of Teacher and student relationship.

SITE - Another reason to be proud of,Always!!

We had just celebrated Teacher’s day with utmost enthusiasm and our President Dr. Pranab Mukherjee took a class and whole India witnessed that. The medium of transmission was TV and it shows the power of communication technology with the help of which we can reach to many students even if they are at distant location in our country.

Video conferencing and satellite broadcasting of these conferences seems a bit old for many youngsters when they themselves are using instant communication tools like Whatsapp and Skype in their handheld phones. But still in many schools (I am not talking about high end city schools) teachers are still using chalk and boards. Communication technology like mentioned above has a pivotal role to play in this field but still we have a long way to go in this field. BUT THERE IS ONE INSTANCE IN HISTORY, WHICH COULD HAVE CHANGED THIS SITUATION DECADES AGO IF THAT WOULD HAVE HAPPENED AS THAT WAS PLANNED.

There was an experiment, an indigenous one, which could have consolidated India’s position in the world and pioneer in the field of distant education. The name of the experiment was SITE (Satellite instructional television experiment). Very recently our eminent scientists celebrated 40 years of this amazing experiment. So we thought that this is the right time let our scientists know to use this amazing experiment in educational sector.

Mind behind this indigenous experiment was of none other the Vikram Sarabhai, Father of Indian Space program. He invented this technology and wanted to use it for socio-economic development. ISRO has managed to convert Sarabhai’s vision into reality by using this technology for communication, environment forecasting etc. but left out education sector in it.

SITE used an American satellite in 1975-76 and it was the first experiment anywhere in the world to showcase the power of satellite technology in development communication. Can you believe this fact that this experiment used to demonstrate technology that can take satellite signals directly to homes?

We are using DTH now in our homes, decades later from SITE. Now you all can imagine that the technology and its application both were a unique product from this experiment called SITE.  India could be the world leader into the satellite technology and its use in the field of education, environment etc. So what happen and where we missed the bus? Let’s check it out.

Ignorance by then Indian government:

SITE was viable and its use was already shown to the government. Indian government expands its television network very rapidly in 1980’s but through its one day a transmitter program.  SITE was a program in which many engineers, scientist from India and other countries and also UNESCO were involved in it, whereas the expansion of our beloved Doordarshan was solely and Indian government program. So when Satellite broadcasted channel like Star and Zee entered into Indian shores our public broadcaster legged behind in the race in no time.

Ignorance by the ISRO:

Once ISRO developed SITE then after that they got busy in strengthening and developing their space technology in launching satellites and launch vehicles. Though they tried to provide educational television in collaboration with UGC and IGNOU but they were not able to repeat the magic of SITE. In 2004, India launched its EDUSAT satellite with the objective of providing quality education into remote areas and also to overcome the problem of under qualified teacher both at higher and secondary school levels. It was much superior to 1975 experiment as it was equipped with 2 way communication facility both audio and video and consists of interactive channels.  But at this time many countries already forayed into this field and India had already lost the chance to be a pioneer in this field.

There was problem in software and education content and because of this EDUSAT satellite was not able to work properly in spite of having better hardware. There was delay in the on ground facilities to receive the signal from EDUSAT. There were no definite plan of action for content generation and there were no single source identified for monitoring and controlling of the program. So EDUSAT was up there in the sky but there were not enough facilities to catch those signals which EDUSAT were beaming.

CHALLENGES AHEAD:

So we have the necessary technology, expertise and capability to again create the magic of SITE but the inadequate content development and management capacity to run these multi-agency programs ineffectively. We need to develop the satellite, digital and mobile technology to conquer the deficiency in education and health sector as well.

Now ISRO alone can’t do it because we have seen the situation of EDUSAT. So if we don’t want to import any other communication revolution so we need to lighten up the spirit of SITE and start working in this area more rigorously. We are not leader in DTH despite pioneering In it but we should not repeat this mistake again.

Interesting Facts about English

Ok guys, this is some interesting facts which I came across so thought to share it with you. Today English is the language in which we communicate normally. In our day to day life, we use many English words and professionally most of the time we have to use this language.

SO I thought why not to share some interesting this PHUNNY language. Some of them may surprise you as well. So let’s begin:

Fact 1:

Today English has 26 letters but initially English were comprises of 27 letters. Though its made of 26 letters but it has 40 distinct sounds.  That’s why  C in Capital is different from C in Cellphone.

Fact 2:

Least no of words starts from Letter ‘Z’.

Fact 3:

Most no of Words start from Letter ‘S’.

Fact 4:

UNCOPYRIGHTABLE is the only word which can be spelled without repeating any of its letter.

Fact 5:

Earlier W is used to write as ‘uu’. W got introduced in 11^th Century.

Fact 6:

The X in Xmas means CHI which is the first letters in Greek.

Fact 7:

“The Quick Brown Fox Jumps Over a Lazy Dog” is the only sentence which comprises of all 26 letters of English language.

Hope you guys have enjoyed reading this one. We will keep publishing new interesting articles .

Krishna.. The Greatest teacher ever lived on earth!!

Today is Teacher’s day and the festival of Janmashtmi. This day can’t get bigger than this. Teacher’s day is the celebration of that pious profession in which a teacher shapes the future of the coming generations by teaching them the novelties of life and gives their life a direction. The second festival is celebrations of the birth of the greatest teacher ever lived on earth Lord Krishna. He gave the direction to whole mankind by giving the message of Gita. Gita has the power of changing lives of everyone and considered to be the one stop solution for every problem which this world faces in today’s time.

So we at Questeach, thought to take this opportunity to have a look at the lessons which Lord Krishna, the greatest teacher, thought us:

First Lesson:

We must perform our daily duties in life with utmost dedication and devotion, all while offering the results of our actions to God Himself.

If we think of results then we won’t be able to perform our daily duties of life. It’s important that while performing our daily duties, the utmost dedication and devotion is really needed. It will bring out the best in you. Sometimes tasks are difficult, circumstances not as per your liking, results seems to be not in your favor, but you have to keep working with dedication and your best efforts will make the results in your favor as well.

Second Lesson

We should be generous in our daily lives. We come empty-handed and leave in the same manner. Our hearts should be as magnanimous as humanly possible.

How can we forget Krishna – Sudhama Story?  That story shows the generosity of Lord Krishna. Everything on this world is perishable and because of this those who have come will have to go one day. We won’t be able to take anything with us on our last day. So you have to give it back to the society in which you are living and for that you need to open your heart towards mankind.

Third Lesson

Life brings both joys and sorrows. Neither is permanent. Practice even-mindedness during both conditions.

One day you will feel good and excited about an event and on other day it might not be the case with you. So never get overjoyed at the time of happiness and never get disheartened in the times of sorrow. This all is a cycle and it will keep moving.

Fourth Lesson

Always smile in life. This one is so simple, you can start at this very second.

So many demons tried to kill Lord Krishna, but he fought them with a smile and ended them with a can smile. Keep smiling in your worst times , this will bring positivity in you. With that you can fight with any problem.

Fifth Lesson

Trees bearing heavy fruits bend down. Even if you have accomplished great things, always remain humble and serve your fellow-beings with utmost humility

Krishna was humble and this quality you will see in the most successful people lived on this earth. When you become successful and popular then you have to be humble. People would want to talk to you, learn from you, and want to know you and if you show them arrogant attitude they will soon go away. So being humble will increase your admirer.

These were certain lessons which we can take from Lord Krishna and it will surely help in making us the better persons.  We at Questeach would like to Wish Happy Teacher’s Day to All teachers who were, are and will be responsible for making better generations.

We would also like to share that it’s not necessary that you should hold a degree to shape one’s life by teaching them. What you need is a will power and anyone with noble intentions can become a teacher. So start teaching from today onwards.

Another Honour for Adam Gilchrist!!

He was one of the most prolific cricketers Australia has ever produced and a role model for many aspiring cricketers due to his on field and off field conduct, Adam Gilchrist is donning the cap of Australia Education Brand Ambassador in India.

This announcement was made by Christopher Pyne, Minister of Education and Training before the start of the 3^rd India – Australia education council meeting and Annual Ministerial Dialogue held in New Delhi on August 24.

As per him, Adam will play an important role in supporting the growth between the bilateral education relationships between India and Australia. He will also ensure that Australia continues to be seen as quality educational provider in India.

The Indian people recognize Adam as one of cricket's greats, and the values he espouses both on and off the field excellence and integrity are precisely those with which Australia aligns its reputation for high-quality education, training and research," Pyne added.

Gilchrist said he was excited about his new role and welcomed the challenge ahead of him. "I am honored to have been chosen to perform this important role in helping strengthen the education ties between our two countries," He added.

"For the past seven years in my capacity as an ambassador at one of Australia's best research universities I have seen first-hand the vital role education plays in the development of modern India.

"Having spent so much of my cricketing career playing in India, I have gotten to understand the important bond Australia has with India. Being Australia's first education ambassador to India will give me the opportunity to put so much back into that relationship through the all-important focus of learning and training," he said. Gilchrist will join Minister Pyne in New Delhi next week to help showcase the quality of Australia's education systems.

With Adam Gilchrist, I am sure it will give boost to many aspirants who aspire for global careers. We wish ALL THE BEST from Questeach to Adam Gilchrist for this endeavor.