SHILLONG, SEPT 8: Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma today said the state government is likely to release the much-awaited State Education Policy within this month even as he warned action against ‘non-performing’ private universities.
Addressing at the 4th Convocation of the University of Science and Technology, Meghalaya (USTM) held on Saturday, Conrad said, “The draft is ready. In fact yesterday in the cabinet meeting, we sat for an hour and we went through the entire presentation of the education policy and I hope within this month time we will be able to release the education policy.”
Stating that it (policy) will be a great mile stone for the MDA-led government, the chief minister said, “We have had our statehood for 46-47 years but till now Meghalaya has not been able to come up with the education policy.”
Pointing out that one of the areas of stress in the education policy is on the quality of higher and technical education, he however lamented at the failure of most of the private universities operating in the state to perform and live up to the expectation.
“I am very saddened to see that there are a number of private universities that have come up in our state and I can tell you most of them are not doing a good job. We are very discouraged to see the kind of work that is going on in some of the universities,” he added.
Warned that the government would take actions against such private universities, the chief minister said, “I can tell you we are going to take firm actions to ensure these kinds of things do not happen in the future.”
“We want to ensure only serious people and serious players and only people who want to give back and work for education sector only those institutes and organizations should be brought into the picture and given right to start the education centre,” he said.
According to him, this is one of the aspects in the education policy which will ensure more institutions that will come up in the future should be institutes with good intentions and good quality attach to them.
Altogether 1094 graduates were awarded degrees in this Fourth Convocation of the University, out of which eight scholars were honoured with PhD degrees, 823 students were offered Post Graduate degrees and 263 were offered Undergraduate degrees.
The University also rewarded the best Post Graduate student with Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Best Post Graduate Award and the best Undergraduate student received PA Sangma Best Undergraduate Award.
Congratulating all the students who have been awarded degrees, Conrad said, “What differentiates USTM from any private or central university is the human touch which is absent in other institutions.USTM is one of the best institutions in the entire north-eastern region”.
Urging the students not to be scared to take risk and become job creators instead of job seekers, he said, “I am a firm believer on entrepreneurship. I am a person who always believes that government should be limited as only a policy making and limited to a catalyst who would allow the entreprenuers to grow.”
The chief minister also stated that the economy can only grow if young people go into entrepreneurship. “You go to any developed countries it is the entreprenuers who drives the growth engine of the country, it is never the government,” he said adding “The government always has its limited role for making infrastructure, making policies, making it friendly for people to start their businesses, creating the eco system and allowing you to take control and move the enging forward.”
Earlier, in his welcome address, the Chancellor of USTM Shri M.Hoque said, “We aspire to become a world class university and appeal to all the stakeholders to join us in our endeavor to transform this university into a world class institution and participate in the nation-building process”.
He said that USTM is committed to the development of science and technology education and research in the region. Hoque has also expressed his gratefulness to the Government of Meghalaya for the creation of USTM.
Speaking on the occasion, Prof SK Srivastava, Vice Chancellor, NEHU urged the students to remember the contribution of their parents, teachers and the society towards them so that they too can pay back to the society. “I love competitiveness for academic excellence”, he added.
In his Convocation address, Dr RC Deka, Former Director, AIIMS said that life itself is the biggest university. “The USTM Chancellor is an example of goal setting as he showed through his journey beginning with one computer and four students and reaching to the level of creating a remarkable university”, he stated.
The University report was presented by the Vice Chancellor of USTM DrPK Goswami. This was followed by award of degrees and gold medals.
Twenty two gold medals were awarded to the best Post Graduates of the respective departments while 10 gold medals were given away to ten best undergraduate students from different departments.
Pallav Bora from the Department of Mathematics received Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Best Post Graduate Award while PA Sangma Best Undergraduate Award went to Dikshita Deka, Department of Applied Biology.
The Convocation began with the solemn and elegant Academic Procession which was participated by the Registrar of the University, Academic Council members, members of Board of Governors, Deans of different schools and Heads of different Departments.
The Convocation came to an end with the vote of thanks delivered by Dr Alaka Sarma, Pro Vice Chancellor of USTM.
By Our Reporter
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