The Indian Express (Delhi Edition)
PM’S message to students: ‘smile more to score more’
Pays tribute to soldiers killed in avalanche, calls for emphasis on citizens’ duties
MANN KI BAAT
ASKING THEM to treat examinations as “pleasure” instead of “pressure” and “smile more to score more”, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Sunday told students, who are set to take Class X and Class XII boards, not to treat exams as a matter of life and death and look beyond marks.
Addressing the nation in his first Mann Ki Baat radio programme in the new year, Modi prescribed “P for prepare and P for Play”, “deep breathing” and “adequate sleep” for students to relax themselves.
“Sometimes it also appears that we are not able to perceive examinations in a proper perspective. It seems to have become a question of life and death. It is not a test of your life. There must have been many occasions in your life, besides the examinations that you appeared for inside the classrooms with notebooks, you had to encounter and endure many tests and trials. And thus success and failure in life is not determined at all by how one has done in the examination; this is a burden from which you must free yourself,” the Prime Minister said.
Urging students not to chase marks but knowledge, Modi said, “Marks and mark-sheet serve a limited purpose. Life is not confined to these only.”
He also cautioned students against cheating. “To cheat is to be cheap. So please do not cheat,” he said.
Citing examples of former President APJ Abdul Kalam and cricketer Sachin Tendulkar, he asked students to choose anuspardha (competing with self) over pratispardha (competing with others).
The Election Commission had on Saturday given a goahead to the ‘Mann Ki Baat’ programme to be aired on Sunday on the condition that the PM says nothing in it to influence voters ahead of the Assembly polls in five states.
Modi referred to elections only once during the 40-minute address that focused on exams, students, teachers and parents. “When I address election rallies, sometimes I suffer from a sore throat or a hoarse voice. Once a folk singer came to meet me. He asked me how many hours I sleep. I asked him if he was a doctor. He said no but it was linked with my voice problem brought on by delivering so many election speeches. Only when you get adequate sleep, your vocal chords will be able to rest fully. Well, I had never given a thought to a possible connection between my sleep, my speeches and my voice. It was as if he had given me a herbal panacea,” said the PM, who is in the middle of a hectic election campaign.
Calling for the need to put emphasis on duty among citizens, the Prime Minister said, “I hope that the amount of emphasis that is given to the rights at every level... is also given to discussing duties of citizens in an emphatic manner. The rights and duties of the citizens constitute the railway track on which the train of democracy in India can move ahead at a fast pace.”
He also paid tributes to soldiers who died in avalanches in Jammu and Kashmir.