'Us' and 'them'

There is a certain level of expected snobbishness to the Supreme Court upholding the Right to Education Act for children between 6 and 14 years. The law requires both public and private schools to set aside a quarter of their seats for children from low-income families.
This step has obviously evoked mixed reactions from a cross section of people, with a level of predictability coming from the upper class/upper caste sections. But what stirred in me a concoction of fury and disillusion was a reaction from a few students of two of the most reputed schools in Chennai that pride itself in having the most number of NRI alumni after having helped them past the imposing gates of IITs and medical colleges. These students have said they would now be “forced” to study with “them”. To quote one: “Our school inculcates value systems in us. We follow rituals like doing sandhya vandanam and eating vegetarian food”.
Sandhya vandanam is a Brahminical ritual observed twice a day by boys and men post their thread ceremony. That this is part of their value system was more shocking than surprising. Added to this was the students’ concern about their vegetarian food atmosphere being “polluted”.
This brazen haughtiness is so typical of the crop, sown so deeply in the soil of such schools that simply aims at spreading its roots of denial to weaker sections of society. This “us” and “them” approach and the subsequent creation of a structured “elite” class is a dangerous proposition to a democratic society. What is worse is that these schools choose to boost their self-esteem by marketing themselves in their websites, saying a chunk of their alumni were settled in the US and Europe! Isn’t that what we call the brain drain?
So we have an India of private schools that produces “brilliant” students rubbing shoulders with like-minded peer group in a “superior value system”. This has skilfully taken forward a system of exclusion, creating a vertical “us” and “them” chasm.
Another thread of argument against the ruling is that the economic affluence of students from private schools may emanate an inferiority complex among their classmates from poor families. Isn’t that another smart exclusionary tactic?
There were reactions from the “them” sections as well in today’s newspapers, with many fruit vendors, flower sellers and domestic help expressing happiness over the chance to compete at the national level. They said this will now enable bright students from their families to shift from the pathetically-run government schools.
The court ruling is aimed at sensitising students of private schools and helping them liaise with their peers from less privileged background.
Education is the greatest leveller, and this will, let us hope, dilute elitism and casteism and also discourage our powers-that-be from using the much-abused the caste card. This could add maturity to our democratic set up. Shall we at least try and be more accommodative?