Centre’s education policy can disintegrate country: Bajwa

Saturday, 20/07/2019

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AMRITSAR: Criticising the Union government over the draft of National Education Policy (NEP) 2019, Punjab higher education minister Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa on Friday said that the policy has potential to disintegrate the country as it hits cultural diversity of the country.

While delivering convocation address on golden jubilee year of Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU) here, Bajwa said, “Hindustan is ours and we all are Hindustanis. The policy should be formulated in such a way that it strengthens the country. Only then we will welcome it. However, I fear, the NEP may disintegrate the country”.

“The BJP-led Union government has introduced new slogans such as ‘one nation-one election’ or ‘one nation-one policy’. Why? What is wrong with existing system? Why it is being changed? I feel this is wrong,” he said, adding, “This policy will show us wrong way and will be dangerous for us”.

The minister further said, “The culture of others should not be imposed on us. We will not only defend our culture, but also promote it. We may lose our culture under this policy, which has drawn around 50,000 objections.”

Asking the professors and scholars of the university to review the NEP draft, he said, “Before giving any final mandate, I would like you to review it thoroughly. After reviewing it you should write articles on it keeping in view our concerns.”

Cabinet Ministers, Rana Gurmeet Singh Sodhi, Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa and Sukhbinder Singh Sarkaria, Member of Parliament Gurjit Singh Aujla, MLAs Rajkumar Verka and Sunil Dutti, Dr Dharmveer Agnihotri, Dinesh Bassi, chairman of Amritsar Improvement Trust were also present.

On the occasion, two eminent personalities Raja Randhir Singh, lifetime vice-president of Olympic Council of Asia and Dr Gurtej Singh Sandhu, senior fellow and vice-president of Micron Technology, Inc USA, were honoured with Honoris Causa degrees for contribution in their respective fields. vice-chancellor Jaspal Singh Sandhu welcomed the chief guest and other dignitaries while Karanjit Singh Kahlon, registrar of the university coordinated the convocation.

As many as 173 Gold medals,

15 memorial medals, Shri Sham Sunder Memorial Trophy, 179 PhD, 21 M. Phil, 256 Master’s and 256 bachelor’s degrees were awarded to students from various faculties. A special picturesque book about Amritsar and Guru Nanak Dev University entitled ‘The contours of inheritence’ was also released by the minister and others on the occasion.