Sunday, May 13, 2012

UPSC Interview of Shri. Navanath Gavhane : Part II


M2: Your name is Gavhane Navnath Kondiba. What is the meaning of your name?
(I think this was an attempt from the panel to pacify me, after my below par answers in the preceding questions)
Me: Gavhane is an agrarian name which means that brings wheat. Gahu+aanay. My name is NavnathNav+Naatha. It is a group name given to nine proponents of naath panthis. And KondibaKond+iba is humble rural name which means the owner of discarded husk.
M2: Ok. You may realize that cost of treatment has now increased. What are the reasons for that according to you?
Me: Yes sir. The cost of medical treatment has increased in rural area.
M2 interrupted me : I think it has increased in urban area also.
Me: Yes sir in both urban and rural area cost of health care services has gone up. Due to weak public health sector private players had taken the centre stage. Moreover the completion in the private sector has pushed the prices. Along with that there has been increase in cost of drugs and medical tests.
In my opinion to reduce the cost of medical treatment we need to strengthen public health sector. There is a need of regulator for private health sector and the prices of drugs and medical tests should be regulated.
M3: There is scarcity of medical practitioners in rural area. What may be the reasons for that?
Me: After completing MBBS now it is a trend that PG course must be undertaken. Now the competition is very high for PG courses. So students are working hard for 2-3 years . If they go to rural India it becomes very difficult to compete for the exam due to lack of resources needed for the preparation. Moreover, medical students are mostly used to urban amenities. And in rural area the problem of infrastructure is severe, even starting with power and water. So they are reluctant to work in rural India. When I joined my service in rural area, I was paid up to 32000 monthly. And if I started practising in urban area as most of my friends are doing, I will certainly get more than 50000. So money is also a motivation to work in urban India.
M3: So what can be done to reverse this trend?
Me: As need in the rural India for medical practitioner is very high we should try to give incentives for the same. I will suggest there should be a special quota in PG entrance examination for the doctors who work in rural areas. Say it may be 5-10% of total seats. We can provide acceptable level of infrastructure in the rural areas; so that they would not feel constrains.
Also we can increase the salary of doctors and the money is a very strong incentive.
( I intentionally avoided the legal measures of compelling the medical practitioners to work in rural areas. But now I feel I should have added this also.)
M3: So your extracurricular activity is visiting hill forts.
Me: Yes sir. My hobby is visiting Hill forts.
(Panel members smiled gently. Probably it was because of my choice of words as ‘hobby’)
M3: Why do you want to visit Hill forts?
Me: sir as in Maharashtra hill forts are very strongly connected with Maratha history. I will say they are source of inspiration for me. When I visit hill forts, I experience those historical moments which those silent rocks have stood witness to. And most of the hill forts are placed in very scenic areas of Sahyadaris.
M3: So what role will your hobby play in your job as a bureaucrat?
Me: Sir, everybody needs inspiration to keep himself/herself motivated. As there is need of uphill trekking to visit a hill fort it will test my stamina. Along with that I experience calm moments. This helps me to rejuvenate myself.
M3: Did you see the TV serial of Raja Shivaji currently being aired on Television?
Me: Yes sir, I know it is being aired on Color television. But I am yet to watch it.
M3: As you talk about Maratha history, what is the role of Shivaji as a king in history?
Me: Sir, Shivaji formed his kingdom against formidable enemies like mighty Mughals and Bahamani Sultans. It is very challenging and I will say it is assertion of Shivajis independent thinking and his personality as a whole.
M3: But why Shivaji is different than others?
Me: Sir, Shivaji is one of the three kings in indian history who treated his subjects like his children.
M3: But it is our culture! And our various literatures has said that kings should treat his subjects as his children.
Me: Yes sir, though it is said it was not followed. I my humble opinion only three kings behaved actually in the same manner. One was Samrat Asoka and other was Badshah Akbar. Shivaji was the last.
Shivaji actually framed and followed the norms and regulations how a king should behave.
(This was my forte, but I fell short of words to explain this in a better way. Certainly it was one of the shortcomings of my interview)
M4: So how hill forts were constructed?
Me: Sir it was very challenging in those times. Before construction they search for raw material like stones, water.
M4 interrupts me.
M4: But there may be many casualties in construction of hill forts?
Me: Yes sir, as the construction is on higher altitude there were many deaths of laborers. Most of them were from nearby villages. And there was a strange tradition of human sacrifice ( I used the word kill) to avoid evil spirits.
M4: What is that?
Me: sir, on Panahala  hill fort near city of Kolhapur there are three grain stores named Ganga Yamuna Saraswati. These names were given in the memory of the daughters of women who were sacrificed.
M1: So it was a good tradition?
Me: No sir. It was a superstition prevalent in those days. It was certainly a bad practice.

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