Today’s Mougli called up in the army

Kazakh television has reported about an unusual case. Here, a young man was called up by the army who, as it became known after several days, can not read or write, but what is especially extraordinary, he cannot speak!

This case is just evidence of papers being often more important than the person, Kazakh social services’ officials commented on story. Today’s Mougli possessed a certificate of secondary school education. It is not clear how this document has got in his hands, though taking into account Eastern mentality, this can be imagined. The certificate seems to have been simply bought by the conscript’s relatives to make him feel like a normal young man not differing from others. The certificate was enough for enlistment office’s workers to decide that the young man was able-bodied and to send him military service. Obviously, the young man did not pass any tests, otherwise it could come to the light what became clear only in the training military unit. At first, the soldier said only two words: “yes” and “no," though later, he stopped speaking at all. He could consort with others only using gestures.

As the commanders then discovered, he could not socialize with pen and paper as well, because he can't either read or write. Then, the unhappy guy was transferred from the Kazakh Armed Forces and sent home. The local TV channel did not specify why the 18-year-old man remaines on a 3-year-old child’s level.

Read the original in Russian: http://www.pravda.ru/main/2001/11/17/33926.html