Dr.Obaidur Rahman Nadwi
Teachers’ Day is observed on September 5, every year. In Hindi, a teacher is called “gu-ru”, “Gu” means darkness and “ru” means light. So, a teacher is one who leads to light from darkness.
‘Guru-Shishu’ relationship is like that of parents and their children. Like a father who loves his sons and daughters, the same way a teacher should love his pupils. Accordingly, a great responsibility lies on the teachers. To a great extent future of students depends on their teachers, preceptors and instructors.
It is the teacher who creates inclination and avidity amongst students and provides them an incentive for performing good deeds and dissuades them from devilish acts. “In every religion teacher is put at a high pedestal. So it is in Islam. The Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)said : “I have been sent as a teacher”. He further said , ”I have been sent to complete good manners.”
In the words of Saint Kabir – “If the entire land surface of the world were turned into pens, they would not suffice to describe the greatness of a true Guru.”
It is unfortunate that today this noble profession has lost its glory. Teachers have almost lost their honour and dignity by involving themselves in unholy and obnoxious activities. Due to some felonious and callous incidents of theirs, people have lost faith in “Guru-Shishu” relationship.
The recent incident of a school teacher named Tripta Tyagi in Muzaffarnager district who got her students to slap their Muslim classmate for not being able to recite a multiplication table of five. Even the teacher told his classmates to hit him. Mohammadan (Muslim) hai, zor se maaro (He is a Muslim, hit harder).How cruel was she!
We may easily comprehend tendency and mindset of today’s teachers through the following incidents.
According to newspaper reports, the 16 year old girl who was raped by the principal and his colleague of a Gov. school in Delhi.
Brijesh Prajapati, a class VI student in Kakaraiya Primary School, Farrukhabad, UP, was found chatting in the class. It incensed his teacher so much that he beat him to death. Arpit Kavadia, a class XII student in Udaipur died after his teacher hit him repeatedly as Arpit’s legs were dangling out side his school desk. This had offended the teacher. Prasad Naskar, a class VII student of a higher secondary school in Baruipur was brutally beaten by his headmaster for not turning up in school uniform. The headmaster left the boy in an unconscious state.
Truly speaking, schools are manufacturing hubs of children in which they shape and shine their characters and behaviors in a sublime way. Besides, schools are like candles which burn and spread themselves and convey their lights to others. Hence, no communal feelings, prejudices and biasness are visible in schools.The crux of matter is that they are minarets of love, affection, brotherhood and fraternity.
No doubt, on account of moral debasements and lack of proper training of teachers, such heinous crimes and hair-raising incidents have become the order of the day.
It is time teachers must cultivate good qualities and sublime norms and set themselves as a true guru only then celebration of “Teachers’ Day ‘will be meaningful and appropriate.
Dr.Obaidur Rahman Nadwi
Faculty Member
and
HOD of the Department of Journalism and Languages
Darul Uloom Nadwatul Ulama
Lucknow, U.P.( India)
