UPSC kar lo, life ban jayegi.

I’ve heard it, you’ve heard it. If you belong to the middle class and have an interest in humanities, there’s a good chance that either an overly concerned relative or your parents themselves have told you that “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi”.

Now before I go on, I need to make clear that in no way, shape or form do I mean any disrespect to the profession of IAS or the UPSC examination. It’s a noble and necessary profession. And I have nothing but respect for it. My problem isn’t with the profession or the exam but the general attitude of middle-class India towards the profession. The attitude is the result of a larger problem of how we as a society treat education. Alfie Kohn in his book “The myth of the spoiled child” states that by shoving competition at our kids, we confuse excellence with winning. Children grow up believing the only way to do something well is to outdo others. Then, reading, painting, or any other activity isn’t something to be enjoyed but just a means to an end. The end is winning. Don’t get me wrong I do understand the value of competition among peers, it’s a great motivational factor. However only as long as it doesn’t turn toxic. And in our middle-class mindset, the competition among children has turned into nuclear waste. Parents encourage children to be friends with smart kids, while other classmates are seen as a bad influence. CBSE every year gives results with scores like 100% 98% 99% which is simply ludicrous. It does no good to anybody, it creates a false sense of confidence among toppers (which last only till their first sem exams in college) or a dreadful sense of inferiority among those who scored average marks. It is so pervasive that every year along sideboard exams come to a slew of articles and posts by celebrities reassuring kids that their marks don’t matter. Not that it does any good because for a middle-class 12th student who just scored average marks, some celebrity saying, “your result doesn’t matter” have no value.

When it comes to competition, the battle royal of it all is the UPSC exams. A job over which middle-class parents start obsessing over ever since their kid scored 90% in 10th. It’s such a sought-after career that whole areas in Delhi are filled with IAS aspirants who’ve lost their beautiful hair at the young age of 25 because of the stress of exams. But how do they even end up here? It all starts with that one dreadful sentence “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi”. Post 10th and 12th most of the kids are confused, uncertain of what to do in the future, some people are even confused in the final year of college. And during this time of uncertainty and confusion, a nosy relative or an overly concerned friend comes and tells you “ Padhne main acche ho, Ek Saal Mann Laga ke coaching Kar lo, UPSC nikal loge”
Eureka! Their proposition seems to have cleared all your confusion. You have a goal now, even if you didn’t set it yourself.

All that matters then is that you reach your goal, how you reach it has no meaning. Let me elaborate. In college, we were offered a political science course on feminist theory, most of my IAS aspirant friends didn’t take the course because it didn’t contribute to their preparation for the IAS. Education is then not something you seek because you want to learn new things or because you want to understand how the world works. No, education is just a means to an end. It’s a Machiavellian nightmare. I know IAS aspirants who can recite the entire contribution of Raja Ram Mohan Roy. Savitribai Phule and Jyotiba Phule and in the very next sentence talk about how much dowry they’ll take once they crack IAS. Education is supposed to transform you, make you question your biases, your prejudices, help you develop yourself as a person. Instead, it is reduced to a mere stepping stone, a tool, something that only has value if it contributes to your win. Because that’s all that matters, winning. Not creativity or innovation or your hobbies. No, the only significant thing is cracking UPSC, the golden key to a better life. Anything that’s considered a distraction, friends, hobbies, relationships is removed from their lives. All that remains is UPSC. These IAS aspirants become a lifeless shell of ambition and competition, with no personality. And a set of answers you know you should give in an interview hardly merits for personality. They boast of studying for 8 hours, 10 hours, 12 hours. But what is the point of that education if it didn’t affect your worldview? And it’s not like they aren’t subjective, they can debate and debate a topic to death citing newspapers and books, but they won’t have anything original to say. Because they never really had the time to pause and think over an issue, hell they never really had the time to reflect on their own lives. If they did, they might realize how miserable this blind race is making them.

The idea that “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi” has a two-fold negative effect. First, it reinforces the idea that whatever your life is right now it’s not good. And it is only when you crack UPSC that you’ll be happy. It’s the meanest lie that the middle class pulls in on itself. The lie that “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi” is right up there with lies like “12th kar lo, phir aaram hai” ya “Ek bar college mein admission ho Jaye Phir aaram hai” The truth is as you grow old the stress will increase only, there’s no fixed point after which it’s smooth sailing. That’s just life and it’s okay because as you grow old you become more capable of handling stress as well. So, the idea that “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi” is stupid because it’s an incredibly stressful job. Sure it has its perks but you also have to deal with multiple high tension situations. So, I believe you’ll feel quite cheated when you realize that your misery continues even after becoming an IAS. And it continues because your misery has nothing to do with your profession, but with the way you’ve approached life. All that mattered was winning, now that you’ve won. You don’t have anything that matters. But it’s not your fault. It’s your parents. Your parents who told you stuff like “IAS Kar lo phir govt ke paise se ghumna”, “IAS Kar lo side mein apni hobby bhi Karte rehna” never really cared about your travels or hobbies. All that mattered was you were the golden goose who was going to alleviate their status in society. The cruelest thing that middle-class parents do, they burden their children with their dreams and ambitions. And children don’t have the option to tell their parents that “I’m sorry but I can’t fulfill your dream”. Because in Indian society doesn’t matter if you’re 50, the approval of your parent means everything to you. It’s a weird aspect of our society where we don’t seek love from our parents, we seek approval. There’s a weird sense of alienation between parents and children, that neither of them tries to amend. We spend our lives trying to seek approval from our parents, our parents spend their lives trying to learn how to express their love. A parent shouldn’t wait for their kid to win some competition to tell them they love them, a kid shouldn’t have to struggle and compete among his peers just to get attention and approval from his parents.

I also blame coaching institutes that profit from this misguided ambition. They promise you some secret formula to crack UPSC, some forbidden knowledge that’s accessible only if you pay a hefty fee of lakh rupees. They sell dreams that never really come true, you don’t go to coaching to learn something new, make friends, broaden your horizon. No, you go there to learn the secret formula of winning. Coaching centers are the ultimate Machiavellian tool that has reduced education merely to a stepping stone. They tell you what to study, how to study, and even how to answer. Coaching institutes don’t educate you, they train you. Like an animal of the circus.

But it is what it is. And while lakhs of students sit for IAS only a handful get selected. While others are left with the feeling of dejection, with dread that they’ve disappointed their parents, they’ve wasted time and money on expensive coaching. Their mental health deteriorates and in a country where mental health is still considered fiction, all that happens is things just get worse. Google “IAS aspirant commits suicide” and the sheer number of cases will send a chill down your spine. It’s a fucking epidemic. After they’ve exhausted their attempts and unfortunately still didn’t get selected they are left with nothing, they’ve long given up on all of their hobbies, relationships, and friends. The year and money they spent on expensive coaching centers just compound their guilt, and they have no one to confide in. Some of them compromise, they give state-level exams, they give banking exams and move on in their lives. But they are never truly happy, and then they become parents someday. And one faithful day their child gets a decent score in some exam, and then they transfer all their frustration disguised as an ambition to their kid. This dreadful cycle just keeps going. Because they still believe that “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi”.

The second negative effect of “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi” is that it treats UPSC as a golden ticket out of misery. This means that after years of frustration and investing money in expensive coaching centers when someone finally cracks UPSC there are good chances they’ll use it as a lifetime return policy. I’ve heard IAS aspirants gleefully talk about all the bribe they’ll take. And I can’t blame them because “Agar Zindagi bhar bacche ye sunte huye hi bada hoga ki UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi, toh woh UPSC karke apni life hi toh banayega na”.

UPSC isn’t a golden ticket to the upper class. Sure it elevates your position in society and for many, it is a way out of poverty, but it is also a job of immense responsibility. Your decisions affect not just you but all the taxpaying citizens whom you’re governing. It’s a job that demands honesty, vision, and dedication. It’s not a shopper stop coupon to accumulate wealth for retirement. But corrupt IAS officers aren’t something that we’ve never heard of. I am not claiming that every IAS officer is corrupt, that is simply impossible. And I know IAS officers that have worked with dedication and honesty for the betterment of the country. Like they should. It’s an honorable job and it should be pursued with honorable intentions. Parents should stop telling their kids about all the perks of an IAS and start telling them about all the responsibilities of being an IAS and the changes that an IAS can bring. And if the kid decides to pursue something else, parents should make their peace with it. Not every kid who is smart and like humanities can become an IAS, and they shouldn’t either. IAS is a noble profession but there are other professions and a thousand things that a kid can do if the parents just let him/her explore, they’ll get lost, stumble, but they’ll find something they truly enjoy doing. Don’t shove down a profession down their throat while disguising it as a solution to all of their problems. Your depression won’t go away, no matter what work you’re doing. It’s a health issue and you should see a doctor, not join new coaching.

I often think of all the potential writers, actors, painters, singer, and everything those thousands of kids could’ve been had they not spend the prime year of their lives cooped up in a room in Karol bagh, doing the nth revision of Laxmikanth’s Indian polity and telling themselves “UPSC Kar lo, life ban jayegi.”