DIGBOI, Aug 22 - Addressing the students, teachers and employees of Digboi College on the occasion of the Freshmen Social held in the college auditorium on August 18 last, the chief guest Dr Alak Kumar Buragohain,Vice-Chancellor of DU called for a total system change in the Degree level colleges to make the semester mode pay its dividends to the students body in this part of the State. He said that at the initial stage, the shift from Annual system to Semester system might show certain pitfalls but the stakeholders, mainly the students and the teachers, must have patience and must change their mind-sets.
Dr Buragohain recalled the immense contributions of the Knowledge Commission headed by Sam Pitroda towards creation of the knowledge-based society in India, in line with the developed countries of the world and regretted that the students of this part of the country still appeared detached from the timeliness probably due to some kind of mental and intellectual retardation. He ascribed it to a system failure. Dr Buragohain insisted that education must aim at the creation of a knowledge base and development of skills including language skills, particularly English, the lack of which had been due to a more than proportionate thrust upon vernacularism. The tragic problem of higher education domain was, Dr Buragohain said, poor communication skills in English which, in turn, paralysed the very process of the creation of an effective knowledge base at their individual levels. In the absence of such a base, the academic programme, by and large, had become a pick and mix matter, he added.
Pointing out that in the present day context, no particular subject held sway singly, Dr Buragohain asserted that the students must cultivate a roundness of personality through acquisition of a satisfactory level of inter-departmental information. At the same time he urged the student community that they must also imbibe the qualities of honesty and integrity, hard work and punctuality and charity and fellow feeling. In Semester system, the pedagogy was completely different and it had to be found out by pursuing an appropriate methodology. He also urged the teachers that since they were creating human resources having self respect they had to build up an atmosphere of credibility and trust in regard to their students. He concluded by saying, �My students are my best teachers�.
The event introduced by Dr Rashmi Patowary and presided over by Dr Dip Saikia, principal of the college was attended by HN Sarma, president of the GB of the college as distinguished guest. KN Timsina, vice principal and Golap Kailta, IQAC Coordinator, also shared the dais along with the others. In the meeting, the meritorious students of the college were felicitated by the chief guest and three awards namely Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Memorial Award, Papori Kalita Memorial Award and Upendranath Konwar Memorial Award were also distributed among the brilliant recipients. At the beginning, the freshers were accorded warm welcome by Siddhartha Saikia, general secretary of DCSU.
HN Sarma, Dr AC Deka and Anu Borgohain also addressed the gathering briefly. Dr Dip Saikia in his presidential speech highlighted the achievements of the college.
