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Correspondent

23 August 2024 at 4:29:04 pm

Monsoon Malaise

The substantial showers over Maharashtra this year have predictably demonstrated that it is not the skies but the government that has failed the state. The intense downpour once again exposed the frailty of the infrastructure that the ruling establishment has been celebrating. From Mumbai’s paralysed roads to the shocking deaths in open manholes sans guardrails, to the collapse of transport links between Mumbai and Pune, the rains have held up an unforgiving mirror to official complacency....

Monsoon Malaise

The substantial showers over Maharashtra this year have predictably demonstrated that it is not the skies but the government that has failed the state. The intense downpour once again exposed the frailty of the infrastructure that the ruling establishment has been celebrating. From Mumbai’s paralysed roads to the shocking deaths in open manholes sans guardrails, to the collapse of transport links between Mumbai and Pune, the rains have held up an unforgiving mirror to official complacency. For a city that witnesses monsoons every year, Mumbai’s monsoon paralysis can scarcely be described as inevitable. Roads have disappeared beneath the floodwaters and commuters have been left stranded. These are not natural disasters but administrative failures. The Pune-Mumbai Expressway, the state’s most important transport corridor, was partially shut after a concrete pillar fell near the newly inaugurated Missing Link section. Opened barely two months ago, the 13-km engineering showcase was presented as a symbol of Maharashtra’s modern infrastructure ambitions. It promised shorter travel times and smoother connectivity through the Sahyadris. Instead, the first meaningful encounter with the monsoon has raised uncomfortable questions over the quality of execution. Was there a comprehensive structural assessment of the project before it was opened? Were engineers confident that it could withstand the very weather conditions for which such infrastructure is designed? These are not partisan questions to be merely asked by the Opposition, but matters of public safety. More worrying is the cascading effect of these failures. With the Missing Link closed, the old Mumbai-Pune highway disrupted and Tamhini Ghat also rendered unusable, connectivity between Maharashtra’s political and commercial capitals has been severely compromised. Legislators themselves reportedly face uncertainty over reaching Mumbai for the ongoing Assembly session. If the state’s elected representatives struggle to move across Maharashtra, one can only imagine the plight of ordinary citizens whose livelihoods depend on functioning roads, reliable transport and basic civic services. Infrastructure earns its reputation during crises, not during inaugurations. Roads are built for rainy days and bridges are meant to withstand storms. Drainage systems exist precisely because monsoons are neither rare nor unexpected. Maharashtra has not been surprised by an eclipse or an earthquake. It has been visited by the same seasonal rains that return with remarkable punctuality every year. Invoking climate change cannot become an alibi for poor planning, weak oversight and inadequate maintenance. Resilient infrastructure is the minimum standard that citizens deserve. The first weeks of the monsoon have delivered an unmistakable verdict. Maharashtra’s infrastructure has failed its annual examination. The government can no longer hide behind the clouds. Monsoons are annual appointments, not surprise inspections. If the state cannot prepare for the one disaster it knows is coming every year, it forfeits the right to claim competence.

Reform Without Reach

Maharashtra’s new policy promises to streamline its educational welfare institutions but leaves deeper structural flaws untouched.

For years, Maharashtra’s alphabet soup of educational welfare institutions - SARTHI, BARTI, Mahajyoti, TRTI and AMRUT - has invited the same complaints. Students have grappled with differing eligibility rules, opaque procedures and uneven implementation. A unified policy governing these bodies, announced by the state government on July 1st, ought therefore to have been an occasion for celebration. Uniformity, transparency and predictability are virtues in public administration. Yet the new circular risks achieving uniformity by standardising limits rather than expanding opportunity.


The decision to allow candidates preparing for the Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) and the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) examinations to avail themselves of coaching benefits twice, instead of only once, is sensible. So too is the recognition that Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes may require distinct financial provisions and implementation guidelines. But these improvements are overshadowed by a larger problem. The reforms appear to be administrative rather than transformative.


Inadequate Reforms

Nothing illustrates this better than the decision to cap research fellowships at just 100 for each institution. In a state that boasts some of India’s largest universities and produces thousands of postgraduate and doctoral students every year, such a ceiling appears detached from reality. Research is not an expenditure to be rationed like a scarce commodity. It is an investment in knowledge, innovation and future productivity.


The same logic applies to competitive-examination coaching. Providing coaching to 1,000 MPSC aspirants and 400 UPSC candidates sounds generous until one remembers the scale of the demand. Every year, lakhs of young Maharashtrians compete for a tiny number of government jobs. Against that backdrop, these figures resemble pilot projects rather than statewide interventions. The state’s ambition seems oddly modest compared with the aspirations of its students.


More troubling is what the circular does not address. The costs of higher education have risen sharply. Inflation has eroded the value of stipends. Overseas education has become more expensive even as international exposure becomes increasingly valuable. Yet the policy makes no meaningful expansion in foreign scholarship schemes, subsistence allowances or other financial support programmes that could genuinely broaden access.


This reflects a deeper misunderstanding of what these institutions were meant to become. Bodies such as SARTHI, BARTI and Mahajyoti were never intended to function merely as scholarship-disbursing offices. Their names themselves emphasise research, training and capacity-building. Yet, over time, many have become administrative clearing houses that outsource training programmes to external agencies while developing little expertise of their own. They have failed to build permanent academic ecosystems capable of nurturing talent over the long term.


Governance Deficit

The consequences are visible. Maharashtra still lacks robust policy research centres linked to these institutions. Employment-oriented curricula remain underdeveloped. Partnerships with industry are sporadic. Dedicated study centres capable of preparing students for advanced research or public-service careers remain the exception rather than the rule. Institutions designed to produce intellectual capital have gradually been reduced to processing applications and releasing funds.


Nor does the circular address the governance deficit that has long plagued these bodies. Independent operational guidelines remain absent. Budgetary allocations have not risen commensurately with expanding demand. Social audits, which could improve transparency, remain missing. Students continue to lack an independent grievance-redress mechanism. Advisory systems incorporating student representation have yet to emerge. Regulatory boards often meet irregularly, while key decisions remain concentrated within the ministry, diminishing the autonomy that these supposedly independent institutions were created to enjoy.


Centralisation may simplify administration, but it rarely encourages innovation. Institutions deprived of autonomy inevitably become cautious, procedural and slow to respond to changing educational needs.


The broader question is what Maharashtra expects from these bodies. If they are expected to prepare disadvantaged students to compete in an increasingly global economy, the policy falls well short.


Today’s students seek more than financial assistance. They require advanced skills, research opportunities, international exposure, professional networks and institutions capable of adapting to rapidly changing labour markets. The state’s challenge is no longer merely to widen access to education. It is to improve its quality and relevance.


Unless Maharashtra expands funding, strengthens governance and allows these institutions to evolve into genuine centres of research and training, the latest reforms will only have standardised scarcity. For a generation that sees education as the surest path to social mobility, that would be a particularly costly form of efficiency.


(The writer is a lawyer and president, Student Helping Hands. Views personal.)

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