Sibal calls western system of development 'mindless'

Calling the system of development in western nations ''thoughtless and mindless'', Union Minister of Human Resource Development Kapil Sibal today said Indians should bring their thinking process in sync with the changing environment. ''The western nations, during their process of growth and development, do not realise the impact these kind of changes have on other nations thousands miles away,'' Mr Sibal said, giving his valedictory address at the second Environment Educators' Conference here. Maintaining his practice of talking about bringing changes in the school curriculum, he said the subject of Environmental Science should be introduced more as a practice than just a scoring subject. ''The problems are not going to get solved from our politicians but our children,'' he said.

Making teachers realise the major role they could play in the same, Mr Sibal said, ''The teachers should now stop answering children. More than 90 per cent of the times they speak and children remain quiet.'' ''Children should be left open now out of the four walls of the classroom. They should be made to interact with the nature and seek answers from it themselves,'' he said. The Minister said there were two things which did not have territorial boundaries -- virus and pollution. ''Everybody should remember Mahatma Gandhi's saying that one has to be the change he wants to see in the world,'' he said. Comparing the planet Earth with a bank account, Mr Sibal emphasised that ''the way a person gets bankrupt if his bank account stops holding money, mother Earth also has her limitations to deliver.'' ''When nature finds lack of balance, it attacks in forms of calamities and diseases and it is worse than terrorism,'' he said. With global environmental concern into account, The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), organised a three-day conference that ended here today. Carrying the theme, 'Road to a Sustainable School', it was attended by more than 300 teachers from all over the country. Key issues related to environment were addressed during the conference with a focus on climate change to enable teachers to play a more proactive role and be the key drivers in the essential process of enhancing environment education knowledge followed by positive action. Director General of TERI R K Pachauri quoted a renowned scientist and said, ''There are three types of nations -- developed, developing and mal-developed. Indians should change their habits before entering the third league.'' He asserted the fact that if teachers were empowered, it led to a multiplier effect. Pleased after attending the conference for the second time, Anuradha Dey, a teacher from Father Agnel School here, said the event proved to be the best place to interact with her counterparts in other states of the country. ''There is so much and more effective tasks going on in various parts of the country which are not known to us in metropolitan cities. In this conference, we came to know about them and will try to implement here too,'' she said.

A game CD on climate change awareness, ''Copenhagen Challenge'', was also released at the function.

-- (UNI) -- 05DI31.xml

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