Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore   

Call for price control to make higher education affordable

ACCOMPLISHMENT: G. Viswanathan, Chancellor of VIT University, Vellore (second right), handing over a degree certificate to a graduate at the Kumaraguru College of Technology in Coimbatore on Saturday. Chairman of Sakthi Group N. Mahalingam (right) is in the picture.

COIMBATORE: To increase the percentage of students going in for higher education, the Government should bring down the costs of infrastructure. Cost of land and construction should be considerably reduced to make higher education affordable, G. Viswanathan, Chancellor, VIT University, Vellore, said here on Saturday.

Delivering the convocation address at the Kumaraguru College of Technology (KCT), he said the Government and the private sector had a role to play in making higher education affordable.

“Both the central and State Governments have an important role to play in cost reduction.”

He cautioned the Government to understand the gravity of the situation. Unless inclusiveness was not give importance, India would face knowledge divide in addition to economic and demographic divide, which would pave way for unrest among the youth.

“A recent NASSCOM survey has said that in the next four years India will have additional jobs in the software sector alone. The construction and manufacturing sectors too are growing at a rapid pace which will throw open many more opportunities. We see a dichotomy here. On the one hand we have youth talking about unemployment, while on the other the executives talk about non-availability of employees,” Mr. Viswanathan said. Among many factors that lacked in Indian universities in comparison with foreign universities, the most glaring one was the lack of industry-institute interaction, he said.

This led to wrong and undesirable expectations on the part of the graduates.

“Graduates are prepared for white collar jobs where they will become managers eventually. They should be taught to work hard, soil their hands, be prepared to work anywhere, even in rural areas and be a follower initially to learn the techniques and then to become a leader,” he said.

He also urged the governing bodies of higher education to refrain from controlling and move towards governing; refrain from imposing and move towards facilitating, and encourage private players rather than curtail their growth. “Too much authority will lead to corruption which in turn will lead to commercialisation of education,” he said.

Mr. Viswanathan instituted a gold medal for the best outgoing student of the institution in the name of the VIT Chancellor.

Chairman of Sakthi Group N. Mahalingam urged students to learn international languages to meet the challenges and opportunities of the world.

“Knowledge of Sanskrit, Pali and classical Tamil is important to support our efforts in research in science and technology. KCT is planning to establish a language resource centre to help youth sharpen language skills.”

Vice-Chairman M. Manickam, Correspondent M. Balasubramaniam and Principal Joseph V. Thanikal spoke.

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