Relevance of Teachers day

Yesterday, along with Ganesh Chaturthi, we also celebrated Teachers Day. Somehow in today’s time and age, when the Ganesha festival itself has become so commercialized, we cannot help but wonder what relevance does Teacher’s Day have?

There was a time when teachers used to be revered and they were inspirers and motivators. But even then and now, teachers were something of an authoritarian figure; they were people we needed to be scared of, which is why, if you jog your memory, the favourite teacher is always one who spoke to you like a friend, who told stories and whom you respected and loved, not be scared.

It is very rare to see children talking about their teachers with any love or respect, it is almost always a mocking tone. The teachers themselves are to be blamed because teaching has become a ‘profession’; not something of a passion. They just come and do a job and go; come to think of it, if the teachers did do their work well, why would there be a need for tuition classes at all? Thus the big question which comes to mind is – what is the relevance of celebrating teachers day when we already have Guru Poornima?