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Chief Minister: need to ensure social justice in education sector

KASARAGOD: The Union government should enact a law on the lines of the Kerala professional colleges Act, if admission to educational institutions on the basis of merit is to become a reality and social justice in the education sector is to be ensured in the country, Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan has said.

The Chief Minister was inaugurating the golden jubilee celebrations of Kasaragod Government College here on Sunday.

Mr. Achuthanandan said that though there was a respite in the hostilities between the government and managements of self- financing colleges in the State now, it might resume in the next academic year unless a lasting solution was found to contentious issues.

Higher education had become an unfulfilled dream for economically backward students following the indiscriminate permission given earlier to start self-financing professional colleges, said the Chief Minister recounting the context in which the State government promulgated the Act. But courts struck down some of the important provisions of the Act following which the government held discussions with the managements and reached a consensus on controversial issues.

Though the State occupied a prominent position in the country vis-À-vis universal education, it could not achieve the desired growth in the higher education sector – the main reason being the neglect shown by the Centre towards the State, he alleged.

The attitude of the Centre was showing signs of change because of the consistent pressure being applied by the State at present, he claimed. The Centre had allotted an Indian Institute of Science Education and Research to the State and it would start functioning from the next academic year. The Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology had already been started, he said.

The government would start the Central university allotted to the State in Malabar. Kasaragod district was also being considered for starting the university, the Chief Minister said.

On the steps for the development of the Kasaragod college, he said the government had decided to sanction degree courses in Malayalam and commerce in the college. Criticising the trend of neglecting humanities subjects in colleges, he said humanities had equal importance like theoretical and applied sciences. “We need to enrich our civilisation and evolve a better society, and arts and literature have to play a seminal role in that.”

C.T. Ahmed Ali, MLA. presided over the function. P. Karunakaran, MP, was the chief guest. Those who spoke included C.H. Kunhambu, K.V. Kunhiraman and Kadannappally Ramachandran, MLAs.

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