Recent political discussions surrounding the condition of education in We st Bengal, including concerns expressed by Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari, have once again drawn attention to a deeper crisis within the state’s academic culture. Beneath debates over infrastr ucture, recruitment, and institutional reform lies a far more important question: are our schools genuinely producing scientifically-minded students capable of competing with the best young minds in the world? Since assuming office, the Chief Minister has repeatedly assured the people of West Bengal that the education system would undergo meaningful reform and intellectual renewal.

Like many teachers and citizens, I welcomed these assurances with genuine hope. I believed Bengal’s classrooms might gradually move away from mechanical learning towards a culture rooted in scientific curiosity, conceptual understanding, and independent reasoning. Driven by this belief, I spent the last four years investing sincere effort, time, and even my own limited financial resources to introduce low-cost science and mathematics experiments for students. My intention was simple: to make learning practical, engaging, and intellectually alive. I attempted to show students that science is not merely a collection of formulas and textbook definitions, but a method of observing, questioning, and understanding the world around us. Yet the experience has often been deeply discouraging.

While students frequently respond enthusiastically to experimental learning, the larger educational environment remains overwhelmingly dominated by examination obsession and coaching dependency. For many students and guardians, education has increasingly become a race for marks rather than a pursuit of understanding. Creativity, curiosity, and conceptual clarity are often sacrificed in favour of coaching-centre routines designed solely to maximize examination scores. Under such conditions,........

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