I am sure you all must have heard about the great ongoing debate in Bhutanese these days. Students are worried and their parents fear about the issue. Many sensible parents do while some hardly care. Who cares? They say. I think this is very sad really. We all go to school to learn new things and improve ourselves, mostly while many people tend to think that by receiving good education, you do service to the nation. I think education is only for ourselves and the fact that you serve we serve in different organizations means that you are actually doing services to yourselves and your stomach.

But coming to the point once again, I feel this is one decision that the ministry of education is taking to make the lives of students very difficult. First they said there is no corporal punishment in our schools. But again our teachers love to punish kids. Some old frustrated lopons take revenge and frustrations on students when they are angry with their wives’ anger at home. So, they end up beating students and feel happy and satisfied and they go home in good mood. When the ministry said teachers should not beat students, teachers were against. They said it was needed to some extent, but not to be misused by the teachers. Some parents supported the idea fully. Some parents wanted to have teachers beat their children so that they correct misbehaving children and become better persons. Who would not want their children to become good people after all?

Now the question is should the schools expel students in the first place? If they are expelled from a school, why can’t they study in different schools? The argument has it that the students misbehaved in one school will also end up misbehaving at another school. This is true. But again, what are doing to the children who are terminated? Will their lives be any better than being in school? Now that is different if we are talking about a criminal case. Sorry I am too ignorant to know why and when a student will be asked to leave a school. I am not sure if sending them out of school and not enrolling them in any schools will help these students at all. The burning question is can we afford to have so many criminals in the country? Another question that is burning now is can we afford to spoil some misguided students’ lives in a place where happiness is everything?

I will only support this policy if it guarantees some help to these expelled students. I will support this policy if only the authorities will look after them once they are expelled. But who cares whether I support it or you support it? They are least bothered. In Bhutan, things that are bound and decided to happen do happen even if there are so many people who refuse. Only once after they tried it,  they will give up.

This is Bhutan.