THE BOTTLING PLANT SYNDROME: Looking for the Lost Space for Freedom and Creative Imagination in Educational Institutions

Dr. Jernail S. Anand

Is everything well with our education? There was a time when India was justly proud of its education. It produced minds who filled Silicon Valley, yet remained grounded in a sense of right and wrong. What has changed? Is this decline India-specific, or part of a worldwide phenomenon of erosion of value systems?

Successive changes in education policy were meant to meet the necessities and complexities of modern times. We have retained the high, moralistic vocabulary, but the spirit has devolved. Five decades ago, education had a moral quotient at its core. Even after professional degrees, men and women found their hands tremble  before committing a wrong deed. The other crucial feature of that era was time – abundant, unstructured time – for teachers and students to think, debate, reflect and wander. That vacant space was the breeding ground of  philosophy and creativity were born.

The Disappearance of Noble Intent

We have inherited the verbiage of our great tradition, but lost its essence while drawing the blueprints for the present system. The National Education Policy is an ambitious document, and its attempt to decolonize the Indian mind is welcome. Yet while correcting the colonial past, we risk losing some vital aspects of human development.

Around 2010, a decisive shift became visible in India, as it did globally. The good old values of honest labour gave way to a cut-throat world of competition in which survival itself became the only virtue. The only mantra was success. Those who believed otherwise were pushed to the margins. The belief systems of the old world of values were given an irreverent burial and replaced by a new worldview based on success and survival.

Education and the New Value-less System

When society consecrates success, educational institutions are pressed into service to deliver it. Today, no child studies a story whose moral is ‘Honesty is the best policy’. To say that honesty is outdated would hurt ancient wisdom, so a new, more acceptable word was coined to mask deceit, double-dealing and the ‘hell with it’ syndrome. The word is ‘smart’.

In the contemporary world, you are not required to be good, because goodness is seen as a passive virtue, unviable in a competitive world. Today everyone wants his offspring to be smart, which indirectly means they can be flexible with honesty. When a prospective bridegroom tells his prospective bride that he believes in honesty,  she often smells disaster and walks away. This small social anecdote reveals a profound ethical inversion.

The Modus Operandi: No Vacant Spaces

To make students success-oriented in order to produce traders, professionals and consultants with high packages, it became necessary to abridge those vacant moments that provided space for the romance of creativity and imagination. Those recesses helped in the evolution of the human mind, leading to intellectual athleticism, freedom to think and to expand. Can we imagine another APJ Abdul Kalam emerging from today’s system to become the first citizen of the country? He was the byproduct of a system based on self-discipline and vacant time at the disposal of teachers and students for free talk and unguided discussion.

In the new system, that vacant space has been deliberately removed and filled with enforced administrative decisions. The role of teachers in deciding what to teach, how to teach and how much to teach has been compromised. All these initiatives have been arrogated by authority. Teachers are kept perpetually busy and students are left with no time to be with themselves. Universities and colleges now mimic bottling plants where students are produced like marketable finished products, carrying price tags. The cost is mentioned and the package is mentioned. Universities have to teach a uniform syllabus, in a uniform way. Higher bodies give sermons – sorry, seminars – on how to teach and how to prepare students for a busy tomorrow.

Academics and Formalism

The latest systems, proudly called knowledge systems, have converted studies into an act of formalism. Teachers remain overworked completing formalities rather than teaching. They are overloaded with files, reports, NAAC data and compliances, while students are overloaded with syllabi always in excess of their capacities. In this messy situation, we have made a faulty bargain. Our products are good for the market, but they are on slippery ground when it comes to performing well as human beings. Education is not simply about jobs. It goes beyond jobs. It is about human conduct, which has been entirely ignored.

Creating a Literati Elite

This knowledge empire is aimed at creating a literati elite. As education is increasingly privatized and the state withdraws from funding public institutions, only the affluent can send their wards to private schools charging exorbitant fees or to highly priced professional courses. Society is thus being sharply divided into haves and have-nots.

It can be conjectured that with money power, the under-qualified offspring of the rich will soon become architects, engineers, teachers and doctors, and we will have a second-rate elite in ruling positions, while the poor who had the capability  to become true doctors and engineers will be pushed to ministerial positions like computer operators, or teachers on contract in private institutions. The second-rate will become Principals and Vice-Chancellors while those who truly deserved these positions will not even be on the faculty. Individuals may gain, but society as a whole is the ultimate loser.

Knowledge and Wisdom

Perhaps this is why ancient wisdom warned man about the fruit of knowledge without wisdom. Knowledge without an ethical anchor is a dangerous power. The vast empire of knowledge that has spread far and wide has little connection with the good, the honest and the righteous. It is often the world of the ‘smart’ people who can bend rules, break faith and twist the features of mankind. 

The worst part of our current trajectory is that knowledge has remained confined to academic discussions and marks in examinations. We grant degrees, a formal exercise though necessary, but students lack the accompanying wisdom which must reflect in thought and action. We are creating a generation of efficient robots who listen to no music other than that of wealth, power and success.

In this industrial ecosystem which has grabbed the educational empire, the government seems to have staged a calculated withdrawal, appearing only to force standardization through regulatory bodies, cutting down on the freedom of teachers and students and forcing them into a dead routine antithetical to the very idea of freedom and creative imagination.

And the result? During the last twenty years, what kind of people have we produced? The grown-ups today are short on moral scruples. Ideals of the past have given way to deals. It is a fall, let us accept it, and try to wriggle out of this situation, if we do not want an indecent end of what is beautiful and enduring in homo sapiens.

Dr. Jernail S. Anand, with 200 books to his credit [20 epics] is a Chandigarh-based  polymath, and a vital architect of the 21st century ethical literature whose seminal work ‘Lustus: The Prince of Darkness’ challenges the moral complacency of our era.  Founding President of the International Academy of Ethics, and Laureate of Charter of Morava [Serbia], Seneca [Italy], Franz Kafka [Germany, Ukraine, Czech Rep] and Maxim Gorky [Russia],  his name is inscribed on the Poets’ Rock in Serbia. He is an Honorary Member of the Serbian Writers Association, Belgrade. Bibliography:

https://sites.google.com/view/bibliography-dr-jernal-singh/home

https://share.google/QtiWrcFr7Sca7v0qC

Where the Silence Lives
I smiled beneath the falling rain,
While hiding every trace of pain.
The world saw strength within my eyes,
But never heard my quiet cries.
I walked through nights without a star,
Wondering where you truly are.
Some memories refuse to fade,
Some promises were never made.
And if one day you think of me,
Remember who I used to be—
A heart that loved without a sound,
A soul that searched but never found.
So let the wind carry my name,
Let time erase the olden flame.
I’ll learn to bloom beneath the skies,
Even with tears behind my eyes

The Eternal Question

Bug bite

or zit?

AN APPEAL TO THE YOUTH

Flipping through the pages of history’s decree,

Did the nation you died for lose its soul today?

The brilliant minds, the faith we hoped to see—

Have our morals and dreams truly faded away?

In the shrines of knowledge that you once designed,

Enlightenment dies while the shallow arise.

Modest, bright girls are now pushed far behind,

As the crowd chases shadows, deceit, and disguise.

They look for disaster in lands far and wide,

Yet blind are the eyes in their very own head!

Mocking great Cholpon, forgetting their pride,

And erasing the roots where their ancestors bled.

Lives torn away under chains of despair,

Frozen in Siberia’s bitter, cold gleam…

Did you face the gallows for a future so bare?

Is this the tomorrow you wept for in dreams?

“The future belongs to the youth,” we proclaim,

Yet where are they marching, and what is their goal?

Awake from your slumber, look past the false game:

A book in the corner, a phone takes the soul.

Drunk on illusions, they shout “Real and Barca,”

Lost in the dramas that cloud and deceive.

Chasing K-pop stars, ignoring Qodiriy,

What hollow idols they’ve learned to believe!

Yet judge not too quickly, nor cast them aside,

Every dark era holds shadow and light…

Even amidst this commercialized tide,

There are youth who still keep their inner fire bright.

Do not ask me why I must lecture you so,

This is a reminder, no speech from a stage.

To witness this silence and let the truth go…

My aching, torn pen could not stand on the page.

When will we awaken? When will we return?

A true revolution begins at the door!

Tomorrow, before God, when lifetimes shall burn,

How will we answer for days that are no more?

{July 29, 2026 — 00:37}

—

###  (UZBEK)

Yoshlarga murojaat…

Tarix sahifasin varaqlagan on,  

Siz jon bergan millat “zombi” bo‘ldimi?  

Siz kutgan oydinlar… siz orzu qilgan,  

E’tiqod, hayolar bugun o‘ldimi?  

Siz ochgan maktabda ma’rifat qolib,  

Shaklu qiyofatga yopishdi hamma.  

Iffatli qizlarni chetga surishib,  

Asli yo‘q narsadan yasashdi muammo.  

Ular fojiani boshqa yerda der,  

Asli ko‘r bo‘lgani o‘z ko‘zlari-ku!  

Cho‘lponni tanimay, masxara qilar,  

Millatin unutgan shu oʻzlari-ku!  

Zanjirlar ostida uzilgan umr,  

Sibir sovug‘ida muzlagan vujud…  

Axir shu kun uchun otildingizmi,  

Siz qon yig‘lab kutgan kelajak shumi?  

Kelajak yoshlarning qoʻlida deymiz…  

Ammo, ular hozir ketur qay tomon.  

Tan oling, uxlamang koʻrib turibsiz:  

Kitob bir chekkada, qoʻlda telefon.  

“Real – Barsa” deydi, xayol ila mast,  

Dorama botqogʻidan chiqolmay qolgan.  

K-pop guruhlarin, Qodiriy emas —  

Oʻziga tengsiz bir oʻrnak deb olgan!  

Xulosa chiqarmang oʻylanmay netmay,  

Har zamonda bo‘lur doim oq-qora…  

Shunday paytlarda ham oqim-la ketmay,  

Aslin yoʻqotmagan yoshlar ham bor-a.  

Demangki, nasihat qilur bu nega?  

Nasihat emasdur, eslatma soʻzim.  

Koʻrib koʻrmaslikka olib yashashga…  

Chidolmadi shoʻrlik qalamim oʻzi.  

Qachon ko‘zni ochib, qaytamiz dinga?  

Ostonadan boshlar asl inqilob!  

Ertaga Mahsharda, Haqning oldida —  

Zoe bo‘lgan umrga ne beramiz javob?!  

{29.07.2026 — 00:37}

Sabrina Ravshanova is an emerging 16-year-old poet from the Kashkadarya region, Kokdala district, Uzbekistan. She is currently a 10th-grade student at School No. 91. She is the co-author of several young writers’ collections. Her goal is to study Uzbek Philology at the university level and promote Uzbek national literature worldwide.

ZANZIBAR IS BURNING DOWN

Zanzibar is burning down.

I saw it on Facebook,

which is apparently how a city tells you now
that one of its organs has failed.

No bell.

No man running up Yonge yelling fire.

Just somebody’s phone held sideways
and black smoke climbing through the frame
behind the gold woman
who has been stepping out over the sidewalk
for longer than most of the condos around her
have been alive.

Zanzibar is burning down.

And the first thing Toronto will do
is call it a building.

359 Yonge Street.

Commercial property.

Three alarm.

Road closure.

Structural damage.

Cause unknown.

All those little clean words
we invented because things are easier
when nothing has a body.

But this place has always had a body.

That’s practically the problem.

They built it in 1895
for undertakers.

Young & Millard.

Caskets upstairs.

Morgue downstairs.

Imagine that.

Before the tits
there were corpses.

Before the pole
there was the table.

Before somebody slipped a twenty
into somebody’s garter
somebody else was paying
to put their mother in a box.

Same building.

That isn’t symbolism.

That’s Toronto.

We don’t tear the old purpose out.

We drywall over it.

Put another licence on the door.

Eventually there was food.

Then liquor.

Jazz.

R&B.

Rock and roll.

Girls dancing beside the band.

Then girls without the band.

At one point the liquor laws required food
so there was apparently a ham sandwich
that went around the room
from table to table,

uneaten,

performing compliance.

I love that fucking sandwich.

I hope somebody saved it.

Patron saint of Toronto.

One piece of bread
passing through everybody’s hands
so the government could say
desire had been served with lunch.

Then the city got taller.

Cleaner.

More expensive.

Every square foot learned
how much it was worth.

Sam the Record Man went dark.

The signs came down.

Honest Ed’s went into memory.

Yonge Street started wearing glass
like it had somewhere better to be.

And Zanzibar—

stupid, gold, horny Zanzibar—

stayed.

Ten-karat glazed tile.

Stars.

Neon.

A giant woman over the entrance
with one leg extended
like she owned the fucking street.

Which she did.

You could hate it.

You could laugh at it.

You could spend forty years pretending
you had never looked up.

But you knew where you were
when you saw her.

That matters.

Cities need things
that cannot be mistaken
for anywhere else.

And Zanzibar was never anywhere else.

It was exactly there.

Yonge Street.

Toronto.

Women going in for work.

Men going in pretending
they weren’t lonely.

Tourists taking pictures.

Bay Street boys.

Students.

Regulars.

Bartenders.

Bouncers.

Cleaners.

Dancers counting money
under fluorescent light
after the fantasy was finished.

That’s the part
I don’t want anybody cleaning up now.

Those women worked.

Their bodies were not
the building’s mythology.

Their bodies paid bills.

Rent.

Food.

Phone.

Child care.

Debt.

Shoes.

A cab home at four in the morning
because sometimes getting home alive
costs more than the TTC.

Do not turn them into neon.

Do not turn them into
the colourful history of Yonge Street.

They were working.

There were men downstairs once too.

Bodies everywhere.

Bodies looking.

Bodies being looked at.

Bodies converting loneliness into currency.

Bodies surviving another week.

A whole economy
with its clothes off.

And underneath them,

the old morgue.

Of course.

The dead beneath the living
while the living danced
to stay living.

Tell me Toronto
has ever written a better sentence.

Someone once danced there
as the Queen of the Fire.

She ate flame.

I don’t know what to do with that now.

So I won’t do anything with it.

I’ll leave it where it is.

Queen of the Fire.

Zanzibar.

The roof burning.

Sometimes history
doesn’t need a metaphor.

Sometimes the metaphor
gets there first
and waits eighty years
for the fire department.

This morning
smoke came through the roof.

The windows opened wrong.

Water went where liquor went.

Ash settled on the gold.

And somewhere behind all of that
the old building remembered every version
of what we asked it to hold.

The dead.

The drunk.

The band.

The dancer.

The lonely.

The horny.

The broke.

The beautiful.

The ridiculous.

The man with a twenty.

The woman earning it.

The sandwich nobody wanted.

The corpse somebody loved.

The stripper somebody loved.

The stripper somebody was.

Maybe that’s what I’m angry about.

Not that something old is burning.

Old things burn.

Old things fall down.

Toronto is excellent at helping.

I’m angry because
we keep acting surprised
when memory turns out to have an address.

We think history is Queen’s Park.

Casa Loma.

A plaque screwed into brick.

A black-and-white photograph
of important men wearing hats.

No.

Sometimes history has tits.

Sometimes history smells like perfume
and beer
and bleach at four in the morning.

Sometimes history has a dressing room.

Sometimes history walks out the employee entrance
with sore feet
and cash folded somewhere safe.

Sometimes history is tacky as hell.

Sometimes history is gold tile
on Yonge Street.

Sometimes history is a woman
forty feet over your head
who has been taking the same impossible step
for decades

and never once
put her foot down.

Until today.

Zanzibar is burning down.

Not metaphorically.

Not eventually.

Not in the careful language
we’ll use after.

It is burning down
while Toronto is still standing around it.

And tomorrow somebody will ask
what should replace it.

They always do.

As if absence is a development opportunity.

As if every wound
is really just available frontage.

As if the city cannot bear
one square metre
that isn’t becoming something else.

But tonight
I don’t want the rendering.

I don’t want the proposal.

I don’t want the heritage strategy.

I don’t want some fucking condominium
called

THE ZANZIBAR

with brushed brass lettering
and a cocktail lounge in the lobby
selling a seventeen-dollar drink
named after a woman
who used to work there.

Leave it.

For one night,

leave the hole open.

Let Yonge Street look directly into itself.

Let the glass towers see
what they replaced.

Let the morgue
and the stage
and the dressing room
and the bar
and the gold woman
occupy the same ruined air.

Let the city smell like itself.

Let everybody who ever looked up
admit they looked.

Let everybody who ever worked there
remain larger than the story
we are about to tell about them.

And if she comes down—

the gold woman—

do not say
she finally fell.

She didn’t.

Toronto burned
the place beneath her.

There is a difference.

Joshua W.J. Brown is a Toronto-based writer and filmmaker. His recent work has appeared in Canadian Dimension, and his poetry has been accepted for publication by The Wise Owl.

Red Plastic Dust

My childhood began
with a metal spring
curled on the carpet.
I opened it.
A hand closed my mouth.
The light went out.

I stood
on a narrow shelf,
facing the wall,
learning fear
as a location—
in muscle,
in breath.

Even now, decades later,
when I wake in the dark,
my body still asks:
Is there ground beneath me?

My uncle brought me a gift.
1976.
I was five.
She was beautiful—
the doll with painted eyes,
dark braids,
and nails—
bright red,
glossy, perfect.
I held her like treasure.

“Bad girls wear nail polish.
Take it off.”

Water. Soap.
My small fingernails
scratching at the color.

“Use the scissors.”

Clip. Clip. Clip.
Ten tiny nails
falling to the floor—
red plastic dust.

They raised us
to fear soft things.
Color.
Touch.
Wanting.

I learned early:
desire is something
you bury.

But the body keeps records.

Even now,
when something good arrives—
a hand extended,
a voice that says stay—
something in me
still reaches
for the scissors.

On the floor,
a red dust
only I can see.