Kasturirangan, who was also the head of the drafting committee of the National Education Policy (NEP), said this while addressing the 10th convocation of Dr BR Ambedkar University, run by the Delhi government.
“India now needs an educational system in line with the aspirational goals of 21st century education. The NEP has been designed to ensure that it touches the lives of every citizen,” he said. He encouraged the students to adopt a lifelong learning approach and to think innovatively, drawing from their cultural knowledge to address new and ever-evolving socio-economic challenges.
Kasturirangan highlighted the role of universities in national development, especially in the next decade when India will have a massive demographic dividend.
“The task of universities in this context is to prepare young people to understand and address real-world problems from a multidisciplinary perspective,” he said.
He appreciated that the structure of Ambedkar University is already based on a multidisciplinary approach recommended by NEP 2020.
Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said that the students of the university should carry their certificates with the name of Babasaheb Ambedkar with great pride. He also called upon the students to join the “Desh Ke Mentors” program launched by the AAP government and take the responsibility of mentoring and guiding the students studying in the government schools of Delhi.
He further said that not only has the quality of education improved in Ambedkar University, the number of seats has also increased and thousands of students are graduating from the university every year.
Sisodia said that the government has decided to add two new campuses and admit more students to the university soon.
“Ambedkar University’s fourth campus, spread over 49 acres, is being developed at Dhirpur. This will enable 5,000 more students to take admission in the university. In addition, the fifth campus is being set up at Rohini with 3,475 seats in various courses. The design of both the campuses is world class and environmentally sustainable. Both the campuses will be energy self-sufficient and will use green-energy,” the Deputy Chief Minister said.
The university’s vice-chancellor, Professor Anu Singh Lather, said that a total of 1,042 students obtained their degrees in various fields of social sciences and humanities. Of them, 438 obtained bachelor’s degrees, 558 post-graduate degrees, 29 MPhil degrees, five PhD degrees and 12 students were awarded diplomas.
Lather shared that 63.05 percent of the graduating students were women. He highlighted that the number of applications received for undergraduate, postgraduate and PhD programs has increased from 23,304 to 31,237 this year.
“The university has adopted three slum clusters in Moti Nagar constituency (Jawahar Nagar, Chuna Bhatti and Kirti Nagar 5/35), where the outreach and extension division will organize its activities. In 2022, the university will start several more courses, schools and Center to achieve the target of student enrollment set by the National Education Policy 2020,” she said.
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