Everyone deserves a second chance

A‘ Failure Conclave’ that celebrates the unsuccessful should be applauded

When Charlie Chaplin said: “Failure is unimportant. It takes courage to make a fool of oneself,” he may not have envisioned the importance an institute in Dehradun would one day place on failure and seek out those who’ve failed. Last week the hill town’s Rural Litigation and Entitlement Kendra hosted a ‘Failure Conclave.’ The speakers had to measure up to one criterion: They should have failed more than once in academic examinations and gone on to achieve success in whatever vocation they chose to pursue. One of them was a professor from Meerut who had failed in physics in the intermediate exam. “This didn’t dissuade me. I completed my doctorate in the subject and went on to teach it,” said the academic, who has a number of students doing PhD in physics under his guidance.

A society that places a premium on success puts pressure on students who are afraid to fail. This may push some of them towards taking their own lives. According to State data, one student commits suicide in India every hour. In the five years leading to 2015, 39,775 students killed themselves.

To pull suicidal young people back from the brink, their peers, friends and family need to bust the myth that academic success is the final goal of our existence. There is some merit to giving people a second chance, or even a third one. A number of innovators, including Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and Mark Zuckerberg, stumbled before going on to create some of the biggest inventions that occupy a significant place in our lives. JK Rowling became a household name a few years after 12 big publishers had rejected the Harry Potter manuscript. Our education system should equip students with life skills that help them fight the demons in their heads. Which is why, the idea of a failure conclave needs to be applauded.