Saturday, July 02, 2005

Modern India's city of dreams


Mumbai? Guess again!

The answer is: Kota, Rajasthan! This small city was the highlight of an India Today story on the same topic a few years ago. You want to know what this topic is? Think of an industry that generates 200 to 300 crore (2 to 3 billion) rupees in Kota alone.

If you still have no idea, read this ToI story. An earlier Economic Times story estimaged that, for all of India, this industry is to be worth 3000 crore (30 billion) rupees.

Here is an interesting quote from the ToI story (with emphasis added by me):

And many parents, hoping to get their kids to catch the knowledge bus early, are starting to bring them for admission to schools in Kota so that they can simultaneously attend coaching classes while preparing for their boards.

Getting into a coaching centre isn't a cakewalk.

"The choice of a centre is not always yours since admissions are based on tests and interviews and standard institutes take only the best students having high percentage of marks in qualifying examinations," said Anjani Prasad Shrivastava who had accompanied his son from the steel city of Bokaro to modern India's city of dreams.

In other words, the best institutes in Kota run mini-IITs!

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