Education creates aware citizens who can guide society: Governor

Gaya: Governor-cum-chancellor of universities Arif Mohammed Khan on Sunday unveiled the life-size statue of Swami Vivekanand and also released a book on his life at the 83rd foundation day of Gaya College.Speaking at the function the governor said, “The aim of education is not just to provide degrees, but to create aware citizens who can guide the society. Institutions like Gaya College have been fulfilling this responsibility for decades.”On sidelines of the function, the VC enumerated the achievements of the Magadh University.He said the university has taken several academic and administrative steps in recent years, including the establishment of an artificial intelligence (AI) centre and regularising academic sessions by conducting around 155 examinations in three years.He said attention has been paid on completing examinations on time and introducing centralised evaluation to speed up the declaration of results.He said more than 6.5 lakh degrees have been dispatched to affiliated colleges to reduce the need for students to visit the university headquarters.The proposed AI centre will offer diploma to postgraduate-level courses. IIT-Patna is expected to provide academic mentorship for the initiative, he said.

Rajya Sabha deputy chairman Harivansh Narayan Singh supported the project through allocation of Rs20 crore from his MPLAD fund, he added.He said an academic calendar covering examinations, result publication and admissions has been prepared to maintain regularity.He also said the university’s pension system has been updated.He further said that around Rs110 crore has been generated over the past two-and-a-half years through examination fees collected from affiliated colleges.The university has also proposed a separate examination department building and a centralised examination hall on the campus at an estimated cost of around Rs34 crore. “Its construction work is expected to begin soon,” he said.Bihar assembly speaker Prem Kumar, ministers Ashok Choudhary, Dilip Kumar Jaiswal also attended the function, which was presided over by Gaya College principal Satish Singh Chandra.