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Correspondent

23 August 2024 at 4:29:04 pm

Trust Reset

As the recent protests over the NEET paper leak showed, India’s examination system has reached a point where incremental repairs are no longer enough. The appointment of a high-powered task force on examination reforms, headed by technology pioneer Nandan Nilekani, is therefore not merely an administrative response to the NEET-UG paper leak crisis but a concrete attempt to rebuild confidence in one of the country’s most important public institutions. Examinations are gateways to opportunity,...

Trust Reset

As the recent protests over the NEET paper leak showed, India’s examination system has reached a point where incremental repairs are no longer enough. The appointment of a high-powered task force on examination reforms, headed by technology pioneer Nandan Nilekani, is therefore not merely an administrative response to the NEET-UG paper leak crisis but a concrete attempt to rebuild confidence in one of the country’s most important public institutions. Examinations are gateways to opportunity, social mobility and professional ambition. For millions of students across the country, a competitive examination represents years of sacrifice by families and the possibility of a better future. When question papers leak repeatedly, evaluation systems fail or allegations of manipulation emerge, the resulting damage strikes at the idea of fairness itself. The crisis surrounding NEET-UG exposed uncomfortable vulnerabilities in the country’s examination infrastructure. The resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and the subsequent appointment of Pralhad Joshi with additional charge of the ministry underlined the political seriousness of the issue. But political accountability alone cannot fix a structural problem. That is why the composition of the new task force is a move on the right direction. It brings together expertise from technology, space research, intelligence, education administration and logistics. Nilekani’s appointment is particularly significant. The former Infosys chief executive and architect of Aadhaar has experience in building large-scale digital public infrastructure involving hundreds of millions of citizens. The Aadhaar project itself was born out of a similar challenge: how to create a reliable identity system in a country where leakages and duplication weakened welfare delivery. India’s examination system now requires the same kind of thinking. The committee’s mandate to examine the entire examination lifecycle - from question paper creation and distribution to candidate verification, evaluation and results - is the right approach. The problem lies in multiple weak points where human intervention, poor security protocols and outdated processes can create opportunities for malpractice. Technology will inevitably be central to the solution. Artificial intelligence can help detect unusual patterns, blockchain-based verification can strengthen record security and better data systems can improve transparency. But a secure examination system requires independent oversight, professional management, clear accountability and swift punishment for wrongdoing. India’s National Testing Agency was created to bring efficiency and standardisation to public examinations. Its credibility must now be restored through reforms that are visible and trusted by students. The Nilekani task force has been given the difficult job of repairing that trust. The government has chosen a committee led by people with experience of managing complex national systems. It is a sensible first step. The real test will now be whether its recommendations translate into action.

Ben Stokes’ Unforgettable, Imperfect Legacy

Ben Stokes has retired from international cricket, and English cricket feels suddenly smaller. The announcement came in the middle of a Test match against New Zealand at Trent Bridge in late June 2026, mid-spell, with the series still alive. No carefully staged farewell tour, no lingering goodbye. Just a private message to teammates that the well had run dry, followed by a public confirmation that his 15-year England career was ending. At 35, after 122 Tests, 114 ODIs and 43 T20Is, Stokes walked away saying he had no more fight left. For a player defined by defiance, that admission lands with unusual force.


Stokes was never a conventional great. He was a force of nature who turned matches through will as much as skill, and who carried the scars of his own volatility into every dressing room he entered. His career highs remain among the most vivid in modern cricket. The 2019 summer alone would have secured immortality. In the World Cup final at Lord’s, his unbeaten 84 against New Zealand dragged England to a Super Over and their first 50-over world title. Six weeks later at Headingley, chasing 359 against Australia, he produced an innings of pure theatre: 135 not out, the last-wicket stand with Jack Leach, the impossible made real. Those two performances did not merely win matches; they rewired what English cricket believed possible under pressure.


There were other peaks. The brutal 258 in Cape Town in 2016, still the highest score by an England number six and the fastest 250 in Test history. The T20 World Cup triumph in 2022, where he again delivered when it mattered most. As Test captain from 2022, he and Brendon McCullum forged “Bazball,” an aggressive, joyful style that produced memorable victories in Pakistan and elsewhere, and briefly made England the most watchable side in the world. Statistically he sits in rare company: more than 7,000 Test runs and 250 wickets, a double achieved by only Jacques Kallis before him among all-rounders of that calibre. He became the man for the biggest moments, the player who seemed to expand when the stakes rose.


Yet the lows were never far away, and they shaped him as much as the triumphs. The 2017 Bristol nightclub incident nearly ended his career. Arrested and charged with affray after a street fight, he missed the subsequent Ashes and faced a long public reckoning. Cleared in court, he returned, but the episode revealed a volatility that had already shown itself earlier—sent home from a Lions tour for drinking, a broken hand from punching a locker. Later came the mental health break in 2021 after his father’s death, a rare and honest acknowledgment that the pressure had become unsustainable. The recent nightclub episode in London in 2026, which cost him selection for the second Test against New Zealand, felt like an echo of earlier troubles. Combined with the emotional hangover of a 4-1 Ashes defeat in Australia and the physical toll of years of all-round intensity, it tipped him toward retirement. Stokes spoke of burnout, of having given everything and finding the tank empty. That honesty is part of his legacy too.


Opinion pieces about Stokes risk turning into hagiography or moral lectures. The truth sits between. He was flawed, sometimes recklessly so, and the game’s authorities, media and public often treated those flaws as spectacle rather than human frailty. Yet the same intensity that produced the off-field chaos fuelled the on-field miracles. Without the fire that occasionally burned him, there would have been no Headingley, no Lord’s final, no Bazball reinvention. English cricket has produced few players who so completely embodied both the romance and the cost of elite sport.


His departure leaves a vacuum that statistics cannot measure. Stokes was not simply a high-quality all-rounder; he was a leader who made teammates believe the improbable was achievable. The next captain—whoever it is—will inherit a side that has tasted success under a different philosophy, but without the figure who made that philosophy feel inevitable. Franchise cricket and Durham will still see the player, and that is welcome; the international stage, however, has lost its most compelling presence.


In the end, Stokes leaves on his own terms, even if the timing felt abrupt. He gave English cricket two World Cups, an Ashes moment for the ages, and a period of Test cricket that felt alive again.

(The writer is a senior journalist based in Mumbai. Views personal.)

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