Pant
Varsity (GBPUAT) – A Case for a Premier Central University of India:
Some Thoughts!
by
Hari
Raj Singh#
Pant Varsity – “The harbinger of Green Revolution” seems to have stuck in the wheel of time – (also)
needs to be graduated to new levels. Over the decades, since 1960, it (GBPU)
has helped elevate the education & research levels of several generations
of professionals. These professionals in turn have performed for self and
innumerable organizations – making them scale new heights across the landscape of
Mother Earth. It is the high time that we NOW - think and work for the ‘upgrading/
diversifying the role/ status/ stature of GBPU’, in the interest of nation
level institutional strengthening.
Some thoughts and observations to assist the
idea of GBPU as ‘a premier central university’ are:
1.
The Farmers
Commission Report, 2006 Views:
The
National Commission on Farmers (NCF) was constituted on November 18, 2004 under
the chairmanship of Professor M.S. Swaminathan. The fifth and final report was
submitted on October 4, 2006.
The report runs through some 280 odd pages,
of these pages “some of the
relevant observations in support of taking the Agriculture Education and
Research to New Levels” are as follows:
4.3.0 Pre-requisites for Attracting and
Retaining Youth in Farming
(Page 112-114 of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND SAVING
FARMING 5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
Rural Infrastructure
4.3.5 Government Programme on Youth for Leadership in
Farming (GPYLF): The ICAR should hold hands of selected rural school
children at secondary level who have an aptitude and means to adopt farming as
their profession. To begin with, depending on size of the State, about 50 to
150 boys and girls should be identified from each State to participate in
one-week programme at an ICAR Institute or SAU or a Farm School
4.5.0 New Technologies
(Page 127-128 of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND SAVING
FARMING 5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
4.5.1 ………In every village at least one woman and one man should be
trained to be Farm Science Manager so that army of grass root
enlightened and committed people could launch an eco-technology revolution –
marrying traditional wisdom and frontier science and technology, leading to an
evergreen revolution.…….
Information and Communication
Technology (ICT) - Gyan Chaupals
4.5.2 Ecologically sound and economically rewarding agriculture is
knowledge intensive. Fortunately, based on the recommendations of the NCF, as
contained in its First Report, the Government has already taken steps to
establish knowledge connectivity through the e-governance and to develop Every
Village a Knowledge Centre……..
4.6.0
Opportunities in Major Agro Ecological Zones
(Page 133, 135, 136 of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND
SAVING FARMING 5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
Hill Areas
4.6.2 Organic Farming:
4.6.5 For farm
graduates, the following opportunities in organic farming exist:
Organic
farming – a value addition viz. Tarai Organic Farmers Amity is exporting
organic Basmati Rice and is pursuing organic essential oils agribusiness …….
4.6.6 In order to
realise the self-employment and entrepreneurship opportunities in organic
farming, adequate training and retraining opportunities for graduates should be
established. Courses on
organic agriculture and agribusiness both for degrees and diplomas should be
included in academic programmes of the State Agricultural Universities and
other Universities/institutions……..The
Graduates could particularly be helped in preparing and using Organic
Farming Tool Kits based on IFOAM principles, which will prove extremely
helpful in inspiring international confidence in the quality of organic
processed foods and other products from India.
4.7.0
Young People’s Mission and Action: India
(Page 148 of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND SAVING FARMING
5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
4.7.2 Young graduates should be duly trained for specialized
production of the various products and dynamically linked with the world
information on their agri-business. Appropriate Regulatory measures,
particularly Sanitary and Phytosanitory measures, Food Safety Standards, IPR,
Geographical Indicators, TRIPS, etc. should effectively be in place and fully
functional. Selected SAUs and ICAR Institutes may establish Centres of Outsourcing
Business in Agriculture………
4.8.0 Institutional Structure
(Page 149 of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND SAVING FARMING
5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
4.8.3 While necessary support should be extended to farm graduates
to establish and operate agri-clinics, including extension advisory activities,
input dealership should primarily be given to agriculture graduates who besides
ensuring timely distribution of quality inputs would also be proactively
involved in rendering extension services to their clients……..One Agricultural Supervisor
(Agricultural Graduate) for every 2 Panchayats is recommended.
4.9.0
Education and Training
(Page 153-156 of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND SAVING
FARMING 5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
Education for Agriculture: The Need of the New Millennium
4.9.1 Establishment of a large number of SAUs and the resulting
human resources have played an important role in strengthening and spreading
the Green Revolution since the 1960s. Now new demands are being put up on the
system, which it must meet in order to remain responsive and relevant. Generally, the knowledge explosion in ICT, Biotechnology,
Space Technology, nanotechnology, etc. and the fast changing international
environment, particularly in the globalised and liberalized world, and trends
and implications of increasing divides on the income, digital, gender and
social fronts have not been internalized in curricula of most SAUs and colleges
and the graduates are becoming increasingly removed from global realities. Basic
and strategic research is drying fast and the teachers, especially the senior
ones, are not abreast of the latest developments, hence routine and mundane
teaching continues. The agricultural
education at SAUs and agriculture colleges must be revamped to become education
for agriculture. For this, multidisciplinary teaching, adequate
infusion of basic and social sciences and linkages with relevant institutions
in the country across Ministries should be ensured to develop holistic and
enriched education for agriculture to increase awareness on the challenges and
opportunities of new and complex interrelated issues and developments.
4.9.4
There is need for a few Centres of Excellence
in Agriculture (Crop and Animal Husbandry, Fishery and Forestry) on the model
of IITs and the IIMs. The Agricultural
Universities Association should not only bring about curriculum reform for
imparting more practical training, but also reforms in the pedagogic
methodology taking into account the new opportunities opened up by ICT for
promoting a learning revolution among our students. By suitably restructuring
the pedagogic methodology using ICT tools, it will be possible to save time for
practical work. Agricultural Universities should also organize more non-degree
training programmes. All Farm Universities should adopt the motto “Every
Student an Entrepreneur”. Entrepreneurship and innovation must be the key
goals of Universities.
4.9.5 Adequate
financial support should be made available to the SAU’s and other educational
institutions which are acutely starved of funds. While the State
Governments have rather liberally been establishing new agricultural and
related universities, there is negligible increase in the overall financial
allocation to agricultural education. It is suggested that one time substantial catch up grant should be
provided to the agricultural education institutions for establishing State of
the art equipment, training modules and their deliveries and other facilities.
Centres of distance education should also be strategically established. In
order to avoid inbreeding, a certain percentage of faculty and students must be
recruited and admitted from outside the State.
Revamping University curricula –
Mainstreaming Business Management and Applied Courses
4.9.7 The following key issues must be addressed towards increasing
employment and retention and attraction of farm graduates in farming:
i) Poor and
deteriorating quality of graduates and deficiency of practical and business
skills for self-employment.
ii) Poor
infrastructure and facilities in rural areas, especially irregular and highly
inadequate electricity and other energy resources and the lack of desired
educational and health care facilities.
ii) Poor
communication and information connectivity; lack of technology- market-and
employment-related database.
The main reasons for the above
shortcomings are:-
i) Routine, mundane, static and
stale university curricula; mismatch between the dynamic need/demand of new
skills, expertise, talent, tool and techniques and the actual formal training
imparted and technologies/approaches available or developed for the purpose.
ii) Shortage of
competent and spark-creating teachers, and large number of teaching, research
and extension positions lying or kept vacant.
iii) Intake
quality compromised, as in several States no minimum is fixed for entrance
examinations.
7.5
Technology
(Page 231 onwards of attached file - SERVING FARMERS AND SAVING
FARMING 5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006)
7.5.1 Technologies which can help to enhance land, water and labour
productivity are urgently needed. They should lead to an evergreen revolution
in small farms, i.e. increase in productivity in perpetuity without associated
ecological harm. The smaller the farm, the
greater is the need for marketable surplus in order to generate cash income.
The small farm can lend itself to higher productivity and profitability,
provided the small farmer is enabled to overcome his/her handicaps arising from
lack of capital and credit and access to appropriate technologies and inputs
and remunerative markets. There is need for a small farm management
revolution, which can result in conferring the power and economy of scale
on small producers both in the production and post-harvest phases of farming;
if this does not happen, mounting debts arising from adverse economics will
continue to affect them. The strategy for a Small Farm Management Revolution will have to be
developed by Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) with technical help from
Agricultural, Rural and Women’s Universities as well as IITs and IIMs, since
much of the action will be location-specific. ……………
7.5.5 The Village
Knowledge Centre (VKC) or Gyan Chaupal movement recommended by NCF in
its first report (December 2004), will help to bridge the growing gap between
scientific knowledge and its field application. It will also facilitate the
removal of many intermediaries from the marketing chain.…………
To
achieve the above cited objectives and goals, we need to work upon
institutional up-gradation at all levels, to begin with at ‘least one SAU’ need
to be revamped and graduated to next level, thus making a strong case for GB
Pant University to be provided with this opportunity.
2.
The (Uttarakhand) State
Perspective:
On 9th November
2000, Uttarakhand came into existence as the 27th state of the Republic of India.
As any new offspring, the state also needed all the care and
support from its subjects for rightful upbringing and holistic development. Of all other
institutions, educational and research institutions are the real building
blocks through which a state can take help for the rightful delivery of goods
and services to its pupils. The state
has been enough fortunate to have a series of upgraded institutions in the form
of:
- HNB Garhwal University upgraded to a Central
University
- A new NIT at Srinagar Garhwal
- A new IIM at Kashipur
and
- Roorkee University
Here arises the question of WHY SUCH
A LONG WAIT FOR A CENTRAL
AGRICULTURE UNIVERSITY Central
Agriculture University
Seemingly the answer to the above
query will need no elaborate rationale and it would be in an affirmative, in
the larger interest of the nations agriculture and the farming community.
3.
An Ecological Perspective/ Thought
to Education and Research:
The NCF report, throughout its
narration and analysis seems to have an overwhelming opinion for inculcating an
“AGRO-ECOLOGICAL SENSE” in the entire top to down function/s of Nations Agricultural
set up.
Do we need to have a
paradigm shift from –
Package of Practices
mode of Farming to Agro-ecologically Adaptive and Eco-sensitive mode of Farming?
In all probabilities,
it would be a BIG YES!
Then, an immediate
need arises for our Agricultural Education to revamp its nation wide system of
SAU’s, which need to be further assisted by a series of ‘PREMIER INSITUTIONS
ESTABLISHED or UPGRADED to AGRO-ECOLOGICAL LEVELS in the NATION’ thus having a
wider and integrated mandate to serve the cause of Agriculture as well as
Natural Resource Management.
To begin with having GB Pant
University to lead the nation ones again by graduating it (GBPU) to new levels
has a strong potential to be put forth as a new example for rest of the nation.
Endnote
With the diverse recommendations of the NCF and the
realities/ needs (both agro-ecologically and state level sector requirements),
the Varsity (G.B. Pant University formerly
UPAU) stands out to be a definite case to be recognised and elevated to the
status of not only a Central University but going a bit further it should be
‘made to graduate’ to the levels of ‘A Premier Agricultural Institution (in
generic sense)’ of the nation.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
LINKS:
- Swaminathan
Report: National Commission on Farmers - PRS
- National
Commission on Farmers - Department of ...
agricoop.nic.in/imagedefault/policy/draftNPFNCF.pdf
ATTACHED FILES:
- SERVING
FARMERS AND SAVING FARMING 5th & Final Report, 4 Oct 2006
- Report Summary Swaminathan Committee on
Farmers (Oct 2006) PRS Legislative Res
- GBPU in WIKIPEDIA 11-06-15
BLOG:
- http://harirajsingh68.blogspot.com
(posted on 11th June, 2015)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
#Hari Raj Singh
B.Sc.Ag.&A.H.(Hons.); M.Sc.(Soil
Sc.); C.E.S.; C.D.M.
Subject Specialist (Watershed / Disaster Mgmt.)
Contacts: 110, Indira Nagar Colony, (P.O. New
Forest )
Tel: 91 +135 +2768962; 0 941 2768962(cell)
Email: harirajsingh@hotmail.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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