“Even after eleven Five Year Plans since independence, higher education has been inaccessible to many,” regretted former Mysore University Vice-Chancellor Prof. M. Madaiah.

He was speaking on the topic “Problems facing Higher Education in the country” at the Teacher’s Day celebration organised at Crawford Hall here on Thursday.

“Post-independence, higher education has not reached out to majority, despite witnessing growth. As such, higher education still remains a distant dream for many,” he lamented.

Pointing out that the allocation of funds for higher education has increased manifold since the first Five Year Plan, Prof. Madaiah regretted that despite allocation of reservation for the growth of all sections of the society, it is not being utilised effectively.

Pointing out that the number of Universities in the country currently stood at 675 with 36,000 colleges, he said that there were 32 million enrolments for higher education, with the number of teachers too increasing by the day. But this figure is far less as compared to western countries, he observed.

Stressing the need for imparting education that trained students in enhancing their skills, he called upon the Universities to make the students more adaptive to job requirements rather than becoming mills that churn out unemployed graduates.

He also suggested the Universities to organise programmes on a regular basis, aimed at skill enhancement of students. Retired Professors Seshagiri Rao, Gayatri, C.B. Ramachandra, B.M. Srinivas, C. Ranganathaiah, Gurumurthy, M. Ramachandra, Sebastian Joseph, Krishnamurthy, Devaki, Mewa Singh, Gowramma, Tarun Kumar and N.S. Rangaraju were felicitated.

VC Prof. K.S. Rangappa, Registrar Prof. C. Basavaraju, MLC Prof. M.R. Doreswamy and others were present.

Courtesy : Star Of Mysore