Post-Saturday Lunch Apoplectic Outrage

From LiveMint.com, courtesy the pen of Mayank Soofi, comes a recent article on the changing nature of St. Stephen's college. This is the place I went to get my undergrad - and I mean that phrase literally. There's lots of things people say about St. Stephen's - most of it coming from previous graduates - but what bugged me was the following:

"In no other DU college is the algebra of infinite merit as complex as it is in Stephen’s. You have to be top-notch academically, have blue-chip public school pedigree or have parents belonging to the old boy network, be part of a religious quota or other reserved categories such as sports and physically handicapped, to get into the college."


Let's start with the writing shall we? What on earth does the phrase "algebra of infinite merit as complex" mean? What happens if we replace that clumsy, meaningless line with "it's hard to get into St. Stephen's because you have to fulfill a variety of criteria." ? Nothing, and the meaning is clear.
Next, on to the reasons why it's hard to do so. "You have to be top-notch academically". This is the Indian version of academic success - getting top marks in a bunch of exams held at the end of high school. I am not the first person to state this is a very limited definition of academic quality. But that, well, nothing much we can do.

What is required, however, is a comparative examination of this criterion. Is this "top-notch"-ness any different from other leading colleges in Delhi University? (I stick to Delhi University to abstract away from state-wise variation in undergraduate education). No. Other colleges - Ramjas, SRCC - have similar, if not more demanding, notches.

You "have" to have "blue-chip public school pedigree". Indeed. By this, I suppose, is meant the finishing school for boys and girls - your Doon School, your Mayo College. Unless you want to factor in the Sardar Patel Vidyalayas, the Delhi Public Schools - presumably, you don't want to. Not only is this incorrect, I take great offense to it, for it implies quite seriously that admission depends on a factor that no right thinking person should account for. One of my classmates, who I admire greatly, expressly did not come from blue-chip pedigree. Many of those who were my classmates came from quite the usual set of schools.

We are also informed that if you don't have the above, then you must either play "sports" (which ones exactly?) or (the writer uses the word "and" but he means "or") be physically handicapped or come from a religious minority (i.e. Christian). Again, this fails the comparative test because such qualified admissions are made in other colleges as well. (I have a minor complaint against the "religious minority" leeway given but well).

Basically, there is nothing in any of the above that is true. What is different about the admission process in St Stephens is the interview - and as the writer points out, this biases faculty toward choosing English speaking students since the interview is conducted in English. Still, an interview does help you weed out what I would call, for want of any other word, the DelhiBoy. (For an example, look at the main actor in the movie Band Baaja Baaraat).

I'm no sentimentalist regarding St Stephens. I don't believe it is the bastion of civilization it keeps claiming for itself. I despise all the rubbish about calling the canteen a "cafe", calling the hostels "residence" and calling the alumni "old Stephanians". Fuck you, I'm still young, and don't brand me with a decision I made at the age of 17.

I do think it is a good college within India though, all things considered. It is not the best, no. (In fact, there is no "best" college, I'm sorry, but the quality of undergraduate education that at least I received was not all that great.) But it is up there. There is no denying that it has a definite character, a presence that I did not find in other colleges. But whether this is more the case in Stephens versus other colleges - and maybe it is all because of the relative absence of the DelhiBoy - I don't know.

Sometimes I wish it would acknowledge itself with a little more, how would you put it, latitude.

I just found it really egregious that such a statement could be printed, at all. It paints a completely inaccurate picture, that too of one of the things the college got right, or at least less wrong than others (the admission process, specifically the interview).