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Kota Factory E1-3; 15 episodes(2019-24)
Miniseries
I could relate to many of the scenes in this miniseries. The makers must have thought that showing it in black and white would give a boost to the nostalgia department. It did, and many of the scenes gave me a sense of surrealism and déjà vu.
In most, if not all, Indian middle-class families, education takes an important place in the upbringing of children. The physical books are respected, not left lying around, especially on the floor. Disrespecting the go down of knowledge was akin to disrespecting the Goddess Saraswati, the supremo assigned to the education department. Every attempt is made to ensure access to learning. Parents go hungry to ensure their kids do not feel so when studying. Education was seen as the panacea for all their problems, for the future and for generations to come. Acquisition of education was closely linked to wealth. With wealth, one gets a clean new slate, free of past creed, caste, and ancestry.
At the beginning of the 21st century, businessmen found a sure way to make money; they promised a sure way to ace the much-coveted entrance examinations like JEE and NEET, to engineering and medicine, respectively. The buzzword was coaching classes. Centres would provide intensive coaching in examination subjects to ensure high rankings, enabling students to gain admission to prestigious Indian universities such as the IITs (Indian Institutes of Technology) and AIIMSs (All India Institutes of Medical Sciences). Every year, fewer than 1% of those who attempt the exams make it. Others have to enter private medical or engineering colleges or do something else.
BYJU's is an educational technology company that entered the business to produce super scorers. Suddenly, the dream of actually getting into these institutions became a reality in the eyes of the average Indian. The trouble is BYJU crumbled under its own weight. In 2023, it boasted of having 25 million students through its physical and online classes, diversified too quickly and went bust by 2025.
In the same vein, in the 1980s, in Kota, the third-largest and a small industrial city in Rajasthan, a mechanical engineer named Vinod Kumar Bansal became wheelchair bound after being afflicted with a neurodegenerative condition. He started tutoring students using Kumon's problem-solving method. His students found success. Suddenly, his method became the prototype for centres that sprang up in that town. Students from all parts of the country started enrolling in these centres, and a competitive market emerged for students to pass examinations. Kota became a factory churning out students who could pass entrance exams. No one was complaining, as ancillary support services, such as hostels, room accommodations, bookstores, and the food industry, were also turning a profit. At one time, up to 200,000 students flocked to this town for coaching.
With so many students fighting for so few places, the pressure-cooker atmosphere soon showed its ugly side. The ecosystem soon hit the boiling point. By 2023, Kota recorded the highest number of 23 suicides in its history and acquired the dubious title 'suicide capital of students'.
This miniseries tells the story of three youngsters, their friends, their teachers, and their centres, who work hard to ensure they pass their examinations. It is the story of their challenges, dooms and glooms as they traverse the journey of life heading into an unknown future with a little help from everyone around them. It is their coming-of-age story of a different kind.
(P.S. Kota is the first traffic signal-free city in India, second in the world after Thimbu in Bhutan. Traffic lights were replaced with flyovers and underpasses to ensure a seamless, uninterrupted flow.)
Farouk Gulsara (asokansham@gmail.com) is a content creator under the Newswav Creator programme, where you get to express yourself, be a citizen journalist, and at the same time monetize your content & reach millions of users on Newswav. Log in to creator.newswav.com and become a Newswav Creator now!
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