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Studying Sikhs in Europe Kristina Myrvold speaking at a conference held at the Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, Sweden
Need to improve examination system Campus Notes
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Studying Sikhs in Europe RECENTLY, the Centre for Theology and Religious Studies, Lund University, Sweden, was the venue for a three-day conference on “Sikhs in Europe. Migration, Identity and Translocal Practices” — the largest event of its type ever to be held on a European university campus. Kristina Myrvold, Assistant Professor, at the university organised the interdisciplinary event that attracted 35 scholars from 15 countries from as far as China in the East and US and Canada in the West. The conference discussed current research on Sikhs in Europe, while focusing on patterns of migration and settlement, identity formation in the diaspora, self-representations, inter-generational transmission of heritage and tradition and translocal and transnational practices. The conference, held from June 16-18, was a follow-up and expansion of an exploratory workshop that was held at Lund in 2008. Gurinder Singh Mann of UC, Santa Barbara, USA, in his keynote address argued that the empirical basis on which the life of Guru Nanak was reconstructed in W.H. McLeod’s Guru Nanak and the Sikh Religion (1968) is yet to be fully interrogated, and based on the evidence in Puratan Janam Sakhi, artefacts and sites of the period. He argued for the need of a more nuanced and comprehensive interpretation of Guru Nanak’s life, and later Sikh history. This was followed by an overview of history of Sikh migration and settlement in mainland Europe by the writer who highlighted the comparative experiences from other sites of Sikh diaspora and pointed to their future relevance for European Sikhs. Other presentations and discussions were on Transnational Sikh Families in Italy (Barbara Bertolani, University of Molise, Italy), Narratives on Pilgrimages to Punjab (Federica Ferraris, University of Sussex, UK), Role of New Media in Sikh Identity Construction (Doris Jakobsh, University of Waterloo, Canada), Sikh Community in Dublin, Ireland (Satwinder Singh, Dublin Institute of Technology, Ireland), Illegality and Sikh Migrants in France (Christine Moliner, Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, France) and British Sikh Youth Camps (Jasjit Singh, University of Leeds, UK). Gurpreet S. Lehal of Punjabi University, Patiala, demonstrated software tools for the Punjabi language processing and learning. Federica Ferraris and Barbara Bertolani provided the history of Sikh settlement in Italy; Kathryn Lum (European University Institute, Italy) looked at the predicaments of the minority Ravidassia community in Catalonia, Spain; Opinderjit K. Takhar (University of Wolverhampton, UK) on Self Representation among the Valmiki, Ravidasi and Namdhari communities in Britain; Zbigniew Igielski (University of Warsaw, Poland) on Sikh migration to Poland; Ajit S. Sikand (Goethe University of Frankfurt, Germany) on Sikhs in Germany and the importance of gurdwaras; Knut A. Jacobsen (University of Bergen, Norway) on Sikhs in Norway and their institutionalisation of religion; Laura Hirvi (University of Jyväskylä, Finland) on Sikhs in Finland and finally Kristina Myrvold (Lund University, Sweden) on the Swedish Sikhs and generational challenges. A film, Musafir—Sikhi is travelling, produced by Khushwant Singh and Michel Nijhawan, was also screened. The film explores issues surrounding migration, dislocation, exile, cultural and spiritual yearning, hopes and aspirations. Ten students presented a summary of their Ph.D research projects on various aspects of Sikh religion or Sikh diaspora, currently under way across Europe. The conference concluded with an open discussion on Challenges in Sikh Studies lead by Kristina Myrvold and Laura Hirvi. The study of the Sikhs in Europe is a new and emerging field and it heartening to see so much research interest and doctoral level work being done in many different countries in continental Europe. The writer is Head, Department of Economics, Finance and Accounting, Coventry University, UK
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Need to improve examination system GLARING discrepancies in Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) 2010 for admission to the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) have now been well established. Although there were marking and evaluation errors of 93 marks in the paper, IIT organising committee called these as “minor” and partly held the printer’s devil responsible for these. Many questions were out of syllabus and there was a glaring imbalance between the standard of questions in mathematics, physics and chemistry. During earlier years, the cut-off marks in these subjects were fixed arbitrarily to favour low scorers, to the exclusion of much higher scorers, resulting in large-scale discrepancies in admissions to IITs. These revelations have become possible under the directions of the Central Information Commission. However, IITs are not an exception. Irregularities committed in most competitive exams have remained under wraps due to lack of transparency. In some cases courts have intervened to provide justice. Some years back, Punjab and Haryana High Court ordered re-evaluation of all the answer sheets of PMT conducted in Punjab and judges themselves supervised the process of remarking, resulting in a new merit list. Those who were not at all qualified for this special task have set question papers. It is not long back that a Vice-Chancellor of Baba Farid University, Faridkot, set the PMT question paper himself on his laptop, a part of which was later stolen by his driver. The Registrar of GNDU, Amritsar, also set a similar paper from common books and when many answers in the key supplied by him were found to be wrong, he shifted the onus on to the subject experts who had not been associated with the paper earlier. The common entrance test conducted by Punjab Technical University in May 2009 had serious mistakes in the question paper. Following objections from teachers, the university appointed a committee which admitted the mistakes as well as the fact that answers to some questions, were wrong. Not only those, some questions were so complicated that even subject experts differed on their answers. This writer was associated for three years with a national-level test conducted each year by the NCERT, New Delhi, in which the question paper comprising questions on different subjects is circulated months in advance to associate directors throughout India, appointed separately for each Indian language. The errors pointed by the various associate directors are pooled and notified to all of them for bringing about necessary corrections in the paper. For the national test of May 2007, these errors ran into dozens, out of a total of 200 questions. The number decreased during subsequent years, but only marginally. There were a large number of inconsistencies in the structure and language of questions and I even pointed out such discrepancies in a printed question paper that had already been used. But the authorities blamed it all on the ‘system’ . For the test that was to be held in May 2009, I found glaring mistakes in eight out of a total of 12 questions set by a panel of paper-setters in my subject. All these were duly accepted and notified throughout India. Imagine what would have happened otherwise! In April 2009, the Central Information Commission (CIS) directed the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) to bring the National Eligibility Test (NET) examination papers of previous years to public domain to improve the overall “processes” of administering and undertaking of exams in the country. Rejecting the CSIR’s contention that “if there is a limited scope of framing questions as the basic concepts and their interpretation are established facts,” CIC stated, “if academics feel that their examinations are not able to test the fundamental understanding of students, but favours learning by rote, the people setting papers need to challenge and improve themselves”. There are a number of examining bodies worldwide which conduct examinations and also put their question papers in public domain without compromising the process. Under this situation, transparency is the only solution to stem the rot. It will improve all the processes and systems of examination and admissions.
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Campus Notes SUMONA Kumari, a student of the Department of Chemistry and Physics of Haryana Agricultural University has been awarded a merit scholarship by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of Haryana. She would get Rs 6,000 per month and a stipend of Rs 5,000 once a year. Sumona is pursuing M.Sc (Chemistry) and doing research on synthetic bioactive molecules. The Department of Science and Technology had recently launched a new scholarship scheme for the promotion of science education. It had announced scholarships for B.Sc (Hons) and M.Sc students covering basic sciences, including physics, chemistry, botany, zoology, mathematics and geology, in colleges and universities in Haryana. Refresher course concludes
The Academy of Agricultural Research and Education Management (AAREM) of Haryana Agricultural University organised a three-week refresher course on "Extension Management". Addressing the participants, Registrar R. S. Dalal said there existed a wide gap between technology generation and technology dissemination because of which the new technologies had not percolated to the farmers at the grassroots level. He stressed the need for using the Internet, mobile phones, video conferencing and other new media to disseminate real-time information on agriculture operations and weather to farmers. Dr R.K. Kashyap, Director, Human Resource Management, said his directorate had set up a business planning and development unit under a project sponsored by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) to commercialise technologies developed in the university. Guru Jambheshwar University of
Science & Technology, Hisar Helpline established
Guru Jambheshwar University of Science and technology has established a helpdesk and a helpline for admission seekers. The NSS unit of the university is providing the service from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. Sandeep Rana, programme coordinator of the NSS unit, said the purpose of the helpline and helpdesk was to provide information and assistance to students and their guardians. Admission seekers may contact on helpline numbers 9996329252, 9050156166, 9255110772, and 9812910381 for any kind of information related to admission. —
Contributed by Raman Mohan
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Shinder S. Thandi