Jayanti Ghose on her career, her family and today's parents.

Jayanti Ghose has been guiding and counselling students from the time when she was twenty-two, through columns in dailies, workshops, and individual counselling. Today she is a regular columnist for The Times of India, Economic Times and for various newsletters. This economics graduate from the Patna Women's College, who started her career from Bihar where she grew up, discussed her passion, family and students with mumbaibest.

On how she started her career in counselling .....
My career started after I got married. I was 22 years old when I got married and shifted to Lucknow with my husband, Sandip. At Lucknow, innumerable students dropped in to discuss their careers with my husband, who was an officer with Reserve Bank of India (RBI). Quite often, he would pass on a few people to me in order to provide guidance to them as regards the entry level requirements in competitive exams in Mathematics and English, subjects in which I am reasonably strong. Slowly this became a strong area of common interest for both me and my husband. My husband's support was always there with me and I started putting special efforts to evolve a comprehensive package of information and guidance for the various levels of students and their areas of concern regarding career selection and handling of examinations.

Gradually I started counselling at National Book Fairs, and writing in news letters, generally in Patna and Lucknow. I did various workshops in different schools in parts of northern India, such as Welhemn Girls School - Dehradun and Patna High School.

Her association with the Times of India group .....
I attended many workshops where I got the opportunity to interact with students, conduct aptitude tests, etc. It was sometime in 1995 when Bidyut Sarkar of The Times of India, Delhi, came with a proposal for counselling students at the National Book Fair at Patna, organised by the Times Group. Then slowly the relation started growing and I began to write in the career column of The Times' Patna edition. They started to carry my columns in Delhi and in the Lucknow edition as well. Slowly, I started getting recognition among students through different news letters.

My husband was then transfered to Mumbai, and we had to shift immediately. After coming to Mumbai, I started working from scratch as I had no base here. But by god's grace things have worked out my way. While in Mumbai, I started to write for the Times group again, contributing to Education Times and Economic Times.

Commenting on her office at home ...
I operate from home, and prefer it that way as I can also keep an eye on my sons, Surojit and Samarjit. Operating from home gives you flexibility. I get time to spend with the children and attend to their studies. I prefer to work at home between 10am and 2pm. Though I operate from my residence, my children are not dependent on me. We made them capable to think and act independently. I believe in giving independence to the younger generation, to decide on their career and future.

On why counselling of parents is so important ...
Gone are the days when you compel your child to take up a career of your choice. Today we have to give the younger generation the freedom to mould themselves as they want. All careers are good provided you work towads making them so. I always advise parents to accompany their wards in order to know the strong as well as weak traits of their child. A face to face discussion helps in solving many complications of the parents as well as the child. I also notice that teenagers hardly open up in front of their parents. This should not happen. I suggest that parents should give space and priorities to the ward.

Reading - her first love
My first love has always been reading, anything and everything that I can lay my hands on. I scan through 10 papers a day and believe that avid reading is the main reason behind my successful career. My reading habits over the years have helped me to acquire a wide range of knowledge. Today with the rate of inflow of information, it is necessary to keep abreast by keeping track of all happenings through extensive reading.

Jayanti Ghosh has already come out with two books on career counselling. She is currently working on a new book. She is associated with many organisations and institutes like SNDT, Ruia, Aga Khan Education Society, and many more. She is also a visiting lecturer at many management and mass communication institutes like KJ Somaiya Institute of Journalism and Mass Communication. She asserts that the prospect for a career in counselling is very good as it is not possible for a person to keep track of all career options, when we have moved out of prototype careers like engineering and medical. The career counsellor has a major role to play.

Author : Sharmistha Chakraborty
Photographer : Uma Kadam

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