Bhubaneswar: Expressing serious concern over the political interference in higher education institutions, Governor SC Jamir Monday called upon all political parties to refrain from interfering in college and university campuses.
Addressing the inaugural session of a conference of Vice-Chancellors in Raj Bhavan Monday, Jamir urged the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) to take the lead and device a solution to ensure that the university and college campuses are free from political interference.
Jamir asked the VCs to create an environment for conducive for teaching, research and outreach as well as explore means of larger collaborations with industries.
He said that the need of the day is to self-discipline, character, peace and harmony in the corridors of universities and promotion of values and worth of responsible citizenship in classrooms and campuses.
Terming universities as the ‘repositories of wisdom of enlightened and inspired minds’, he urged everyone concerned to make higher education a foundation of a developed, prosperous and enlightened society.
The VCs were instructed to focus on quality, relevance and excellence in universities to meet global standards of excellence in academic as well as research. Jamir asked universities to make every effort for both students and teachers to acquire multi-tasking skills in order to apply theoretical knowledge to real-world problems.
“The 21st century bestows upon the universities a great responsibility to provide the nation with inspired and ignited minds of graduates and post-graduates as well as scholars of eminence who would fuel unprecedented growth and development and advance the frontiers of knowledge, while shrinking the boundaries of ignorance. They must strive to nurture creativity and innovativeness in abundance to manifest the fullest human potential,” he said.
Regarding faculty, the Governor urged upon universities to make best efforts to adhere to faculty-student ratio and stay focused on faculty development through training and orientation for augmented capabilities.
The conference deliberated at length on various topics such as timely conduct of examination, publication of results and distribution of certificates, filling up of existing posts, sports complex in all state universities, campus discipline and improvement of academic ambience.
Higher Education Minister Ananta Das, Finance Minister Sashibhusan Behera Agriculture Minister Pradeep Maharathy and others attended the meet.
PNN
