Bengaluru City University (BCU) can look to making use of provisions in the National Education Policy (NEP) to expand its offerings, said K. Kasturirangan, chairman of Drafting Committee, NEP and the National Curriculum Framework, Ministry of Human Resource Development.
Delivering the address at the BCU’s first convocation here on Monday, Dr. Kasturirangan said NEP gives major emphasis to holistic, multidisciplinary education as a foundational component at all levels of education, particularly undergraduate education. The present silo-based approach to undergraduate education must transform into an integrated, multidisciplinary, holistic approach to liberal education. The University Grants Commission recently put out draft guidelines for transforming higher education institutions into multidisicplinary institutions.
“BCU can also look to making use of these provisions in innovative ways to expand your offerings,” he said and suggested including some opportunities for undergraduate research. He also suggested BCU could consider hosting a Centre of Excellence in Educational Technology and work closely with the proposed National Educational Technology Forum.
At the postgraduate level, the National Research Foundation, as suggested by NEP, will nurture a vibrant research ecosystem by building research capacity across all institutions and all levels, from undergraduate to Ph.D. “Masters and PH.D. programmes must seek to provide teaching experience alongside exposure to research... if implemented, these steps will qualitatively improve not only teaching and research, but also be an instrument of providing wide-ranging inputs for innovations and the ability to solve problems in multidisciplinary domains of value to society,” he added.
Pro-chancellor and Minister for Higher Education C.N. Ashwath Narayan pointed out that women had outperformed men. He said the number of students under BCU should increase multifold. At present, 1.3 lakh students were pursuing education in various institutions affiliated to BCU. “The sphere of higher education should become self-reliant and the practice of looking at the Government for resources should come to an end. The NEP will award autonomy and freedom to universities. The administrative process is being made paperless,” he said and added that NEP envisages meaningful linkages between academics and industries, which would help address the unemployment issue.
Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot, who is also the Chancellor, gave away rank certificates to 84 students, including 64 postgraduate students and six undergraduate students who received gold medals and cash prizes. Doctorate degrees were given to M.R. Jaishankar (social service), V. Ravichandran (cinema), and Satyanarayana Murthy (medicine).
Two Syndicate members threaten to resign
Two Syndicate members of Bangalore University, who were nominated by the State Government, have threatened to resign.
On Monday, nominated members T.V. Raju and Gopinath questioned the withdrawal of nomination of Sohan Lal and Govindaraj. In their place, the Government has nominated two others already.
Opposing the development, they claimed that two other members nominated by the Government would also resign from the post along with them. They charged that no reasons were cited by the Government for withdrawing nomination of Mr. Lal and Dr. Govindaraj. They claimed that Mr. Lal raised objections about utilisation of funds allocated to the university for construction of a block at the University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering that has already been declared as an autonomous institution. The two members have now sought an inquiry into the allegations of misappropriation of funds.
