Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Educational empowerment of society is a must: Meira Kumar

• Contribution of Babu Jagjivam Ram to agricultural and defence sectors recalled
• Aim of Vision 2025 is to put Mysore varsity among the 150 best universities in the world

Mysore: Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar has said there is a need to make more investments in infrastructure for education, improving the quality of education and augmenting the output from institutions, mainly in higher education, in order to stimulate economic development and meet greater national ideals.

“As the world moves to become a knowledge society, universities and institutions of higher learning have to rise to the challenge of developing human resource and meeting requirements to achieve national interests,” she said. Speaking after receiving the honorary doctorate conferred on her by the University of Mysore here on Tuesday, Ms. Kumar, who could not attend the convocation of the university to receive the honour, argued that women's empowerment would continue to be a distant dream if equal opportunities were not ensured for girls' education. “Our failure to provide effective opportunities for the education of the girl child will prevent half our population from exercising their rights,” she stated.
Referring to the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, which was passed recently, the Speaker said that democracy could not thrive unless there was equal participation by men and women in different national activities. Educational empowerment of all sections of society, including women, was a must, she added.

Thanking the university for the honour, Ms. Kumar said that the University of Mysore was one of the most reputed centres of learning and that she accepted the honour with the utmost humility.

Later, Ms. Kumar laid the foundation stone for the Babu Jagjivan Ram Studies, Research and Extension Centre. Incidentally, Ms. Kumar inaugurated the Babu Jagjivan Ram Study Chair in the university in 2003. The former MP C.H. Vijayashankar inaugurated the Babu Jagjivam Ram Chair building on the occasion.

University Grants Commission Chairman Sukhadeo Thorat, who also received an honorary doctorate, thanked the university. It is the second university to receive a Rs. 100-crore special grant for infrastructure and academic development, he said.

Prof. Thorat inaugurated the Digital Information Resource Centre.
Governor H.R. Bhardwaj, after presenting the honorary doctorate degrees, released the Vision 2025-University of Mysore document. In his address, he recalled the contribution of Babu Jagjivam Ram to the agricultural and defence sectors. Encyclopaedias released

On the occasion, Minister for State for Railways K.H. Muniyappa released the encyclopaedia of history and archaeology in Kannada and Minister for Higher Education Arvind Limbavali released the encyclopaedia of geology in Kannada. Writer Chandrashekara Patil spoke on the encyclopaedias.