Thursday, 6 February 2014 00:00
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The untimely death of a student during leadership training by the Army raises serious questions about the safety of the program foisted on university entrants by the Government, especially since it comes just six months after a principal died during a similar training session.
The student, Lahiru Sandaruwan Rathnayake of Kudawewa, Ambagaswewa, Nochchiyagama, was undergoing the ‘Leadership and Personality Development’ Joint Training Program at Sri Lanka Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (SLEME) Training School of the Army at Gannoruwa.
He became ill during the program and was admitted to the Peradeniya Teaching Hospital on January 26 and subjected to an urgent laparotomy surgery on Tuesday (28 January), the Army said in a statement. Rathnayake succumbed to his illness on Saturday (1 February).
The Ceylon Teacher Services Union insists that the Army and by extension the Government should take responsibility for the death as the health condition of the student should have been ascertained before he was subjected to vigorous physical exertion. Interestingly a similar situation took place in June last year when a principal, attempting to gain more credit for himself and his school, died during a similar program. The 52-year-old principal was trying to earn a Major titled that was being handed out by the Education Ministry.
The leadership programs were trotted out as a solution to the “indiscipline” seen in the education system and was controversial from the start. While the Education and Higher Education Ministers believed university students and principals would behave better if they were militarised, others felt that it was a scrappy band-aid to a serious problem.
On the surface the training would bolster discipline and even empower the student to stand up to ragging, which has been rampant in the local university system for decades. Of late the Government surreptitiously opening the back door to private universities, cutting back funding to education and not formulating progressive policies for the sector have deepened the divide between students, unions and the Government.
Both the school and university systems in Sri Lanka continue to suffer from deep politicisation, cronyism, corruption and mismanagement. The Government has made marginal increases to the Budget allocations for this sector year after year and in fact continues to devolve its running to parents. Quality education has become limited to the rich and policies to improve schools and public universities remain limited to paper. Yet the Government is opening up the sector to private universities with no regulations or standardisation.
Given the current situation, the exact merits of the training program have to be evaluated and weighed against its cost, that of two lives. It is obvious the program, regardless of whatever the Government will say to save itself, needs to be revamped or, better still, done away with altogether. Two lives have been sacrificed to this quest for “discipline.” But has there been any tangible improvement beyond the cosmetic? Surely two deaths is enough?
The Army has decided to conduct the funeral of the dead student and even gone so far as to promise a new house for the bereaved family, built at Army, or more accurately public, cost. It is clear as with the previous instance no independent inquiry will be made and justice will continue to elude both these two people and the sector they belong to.
