To be selected as a Member of Parliament in India one must atleast be a graduate.

Before voting, I urge the audience to revisit the resolution of this debate, which reads, “To be selected as a Member of Parliament in India one must at least be a graduate. ” I have contended that Pro has absolutely no interest in this resolution, and has been arguing for “To be selected as a Member of Parliament in India one must be literate. ”Both Pro and I agree that literacy is crucial for a capable politician, and I seriously think few people would even think of opposing the stance that “all politicians should be literate. ” Unfortunately, this is peripheral to the resolution of this particular debate. Pro has attempted to mend this fatal flaw in his argument by half-heartedly suggesting how the two – literacy and having a graduate degree – are effectively equivalent. Yet, it should be undoubtedly clear that they are not. UNESCO’s definition of literacy is the "ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate, compute and use printed and written materials associated with varying contexts… allowing individuals to participate fully in their community and wider society. " [8] Based on available statistics, India had a literacy rate of 74.04% in 2011 [9]. However, only 1% of the Indian population holds a graduate degree. Given that graduates are an incredibly minute subset of all literate Indians, all arguments Pro has advanced in favor of literate Indian politicians, whilst important in themselves, are entirely irrelevant to the resolution of this debate. The reason I attacked Pro’s standard of a graduate degree as “arbitrary” is precisely because he has not furnished any argument to show how a graduate degree is the most ideal and reasonable standard among the various possibilities (primary education, secondary education, homeschooled, technical education, etc. ). Without any justification, he asserts that his “specific standard” has “successfully… [set] a bench mark,” when it’s little more than his own opinion. On the other hand, I have repeatedly called into question the effectiveness of the “graduate degree” as a workable benchmark of how suitable an individual is for political office. Pro responds to my skepticism by writing, “there will always be incapable fraction of people, but that doesn't mean we should overlook the capable ones. ” This only reinforces my point. Pro agrees that people should be appraised and selected based on how capable they are, which calls for a more complex set of qualities than something as frivolous as Pro’s arbitrary standard of formal education. My intention of raising India’s poor quality of tertiary education and the rampant corruption of universities is, precisely, to demonstrate the remarkably tenuous correlation between having a graduate degree (in India) and possessing the qualities of an excellent politician. Pro continues by quoting from Ratatouille, “its [sic] not that anyone can be a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere,” yet he insists on disqualifying 99% of the population from serving the people by virtue of his whimsical criterion. I don’t think he has truly acknowledged the alarming exclusivity intrinsic in his very proposal. The reason for having raised the affective divide in Singapore is to illustrate a highly likely scenario that would result from insisting on exceptional educational qualifications for politicians. The majority of the members of parliament in Singapore, and especially those in the Cabinet, have graduate or even postgraduate degrees from top universities around the world such as Harvard and Oxford. Their Prime Minister is a Cambridge graduate. Nevertheless, the average Singaporean is highly disillusioned with the governing authority’s capability to satisfactorily represent the people’s interest. The polarization between the governing authority and the governed in India will only be accentuated if Pro’s elitist proposal is passed as law. ConclusionPro concludes the debate by reiterating his belief that “educated politicians can make a difference in this country. ” I share his optimism here. Yet, as I’ve emphasized, he has not sufficiently fulfilled his burden of showing how a graduate degree is the ideal standard of education. Neither has he taken seriously my various objections, which include: (i) the fracture between his idealized conception of higher education and true state of higher education in India today; (ii) the consequences of political elitism and stratification; and (iii) the potential affective divide between the government and the people. Further, Pro has failed to consider how many passionate, capable candidates with the right qualities would be unfairly denied the chance to even apply for political office if they happen to be in the 99% precluded by his “blanket” proposal. The resolution is therefore negated. Thank you. Sources:[8] . http://unesdoc.unesco.org...[9] . http://en.wikipedia.org...