Oh Darling...yeh hai India

Never confess. I repeat never ever confess.

If spotted, swallow the chits.

If caught red-handed, make allegations of bias against the person who caught you.

These are not notes from an Al Qaida manual but quotes from a special session conducted by a handful of city coaching classes on 'cheating and how to cope if caught'. Listening in rapt attention are hundreds of 16-year-olds who will appear for the SSC exam in a fortnight. In these special sessions, Gen Next is also taught how to get rid of the guilt that comes with copying.

TOI has learnt from students and parents that this happens in at least five coaching classes across Mumbai; in Mulund, Sion, Andheri and Thane.

It is never announced beforehand that tips would be given on cheating. Also, like a student who attended this lecture in a coaching class in Sion on Saturday said: "I was told it is a general lecture for important tips on how to write the exam and how to revise before the exam. But after some time, we were being told how to copy safely and escape if caught copying."

Recreating the scenario in the lecture hall, this tenth grader with some other friends added: "Soon after the basic instructions, like carrying your hall ticket and sharpened pencils was over, the professor said, 'if you get too tensed, it's fine to copy. There are ways to do that without getting caught'." Quoting the teacher, she added: "You can either carry chits or in desperate situations even your text, in case your exam seat is a window seat."

On carrying chits: "To use this method of copying, you will have to practice how to swallow paper quickly. Try doing that at home before you go for the examination," the professor recommended. According to them, chits can be safely hidden in socks and under shirt sleeves. For girls, professors say, writing on thighs is pretty safe. Copying from neighbours: In case you ask a neighbour to throw his supplement and the supervisor notices it, blame that neighbour. Pick up the supplement and loudly tell the neighbour to "take care of the supplements".

At another class in Mulund, children were told that it was fine to "get objectives checked from neighbours." Similarly, a student who appeared for her tenth grade exam last year said that professors at Bharat Classes, where she went for tuitions did mention that if they indulged in the crime, they must be "bindaas". Students were advised that if they take their texts inside, caution must be taken to ensure that their names are not written on the texts. Also, when the supervisor notices the book, throw it from the window or ahead. "This will ensure that there is no clarity on the real owner of the book," a professor in that coaching class said.

Lastly, most classes laid emphasis that no bribe must be given to supervisors. The word "sorry" must never be uttered, they advice. Like a student who attended a session in Andheri said: "My professor told me that even if the supervisor takes you to the principal, go there and argue. Ask them what proof do you have? It's fine if you waste some time. To waste 20 or 30 minutes is better than wasting three years." She added, quietly, "The professor who spoke about this also said that I should confidently blame the supervisor and say that s/he is biased with me, doesn't give me supplements quickly and now she's charging allegations of cheating against me. But I am a good student and I will not accept that I cheated. Because I didn't."

When this correspondent telephoned the proprietor of Bharat Classes, he applied the same technique that he taught his students. "This is a wrong number, I don't run any coaching class," said the man. The telephone number was tried again six times, but there was always the same reply.

I love America...

Most Americans are entirely unaware that the most pro-US foreign country in the world is India. It is also one of the only countries where George W. Bush is more highly regarded than in the US. The reason for this is that during the period of Indian socialism and economic isolation (1947-91), Indians were fed a constant diet of anti-American, anti-capitalism propaganda. The utter failure of India's socialist policies, combined with the emergence of the Indian-American community as the wealthiest ethnic group in the US, led to a deep appreciation for a socioeconomic system proven to empower Indians. As a democracy, Indians could understand America more readily than the Chinese or Arabs could. All this has led to a nation with 3 times the population of Europe trending towards becoming one of America's closest economic, political, ideological, and military allies.

Another opportunity to pretend to care...

As Shaukat Ali Rana crossed over to Pakistan on Saturday with the charred bodies of his five children killed in the Samjhauta Express terror attack, another equally poignant story of human loss surfaced. That was of Shabir Ahmed, who having left his country of birth as a young boy had desperately wanted to return.

But unknown to him destiny had granted him just a one-way ticket to India. Returning to India from Pakistan, where he had settled in 1989 as an 18-year-old, Shabir perished in the ghastly Samjhauta Express blasts along with his wife and four children. As if that was not enough of a tragedy, his brother-in-law Fakruddin, too, died with his entire family of four.

As Shabir’s brother Mohammad Javed, a resident of Gaya in Bihar, tearfully identified five of the bodies at the Civil Hospital here, he said, ‘‘Bhai jaan had come to meet us after so many years. It was such a happy occasion, especially for my mother, who was overjoyed to see her eldest son.’’

Borrowed words...

The Indian reality is both transparent and opaque simultaneously. What is visible is as much a part of the truth as what remains unseen. Over the years the Indian leadership, and the educated Indian, have deliberately projected and embellished an image about Indians they know to be untrue, and have willfully encouraged the well-meaning but credulous foreign observer (and even more the foreign scholar) to accept it. What is worse, they have fallen in love with that image, and can no longer accept it as untrue.

India has been a parliamentary democracy since independence in 1947; therefore Indians are undeniably democratic by temperament. Several important religions were born and flourish in India; therefore Indians are essentially spiritual in their outlook. People of different faiths have found a home in India; therefore Indians are basically tolerant by nature. Gandhi defeated the British by relying on ahimsa, his doctrine of non-violence; therefore Indians are peaceful and non-violent in temperament. Hindu philosophy considers the real world as transient and ephemeral; therefore, Hindus are “otherworldly” and unmaterialistic in their thinking.

To demolish the untruths of the past requires courage, because it is tantamount to questioning the dogmas of the modern state. Why do Indians prostrate themselves so abjectly before the rich and the mighty, and why are they so indifferent to the suffering of the weak and the poor? Why has a nation, which had Gandhi as its towering role model of rectitude, become so unbelievably corrupt so quickly? The Hindus practised untouchability against the largest numbers of their own faith. Do they then really have a claim to being called tolerant? If not, why has secularism survived in India? Can a people, whose educated members beat up a domestic servant to near death, blind undertrials to extract a confession, or burn wives for dowry, be non-violent in their make-up? If not, why did Gandhi's strategy of ahimsa succeed?