'PM concerned over Knowledge Comm functioning'

Chidambaram (Tamil Nadu), Jan 6: Difference have surfaced in the top echelons of the Knowledge Commission with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh expressing concern over the functioning of the body he had set up to make India a knowledge-based society.

''The Commission is not functioning the way it should, and I have conveyed this to the Prime Minister when I met him two weeks ago,'' Commission Vice-Chairman P M Bhargava told reporters after his presentation at the ongoing 94th India Science Congress here.

''The Prime Minister has expressed concern, and I am scheduled to meet him again on January 9,'' he said in reply to a question.

Dr Bhargava said he did not agree with lot of things in the Commission's Report on Higher Education submitted to the Prime Minister.

He said many of his recommendations, such as undergraduate courses in every university, did not find mention in the Report.

''We have learn to respect dissent,'' he added.

Dr Bhargava said he did not get to read the Report before it was submitted to the Prime Minister.

''I came to know only from the newpapers that it has been submitted,'' he said.

''Asked whether Commission's Chairman Sam Pitroda was responsible for it, he said: ''Sam is a very capable person, but as Chairman he can't escape responsibility.'' Dr Bhargava was, however, quick to add that he was not blaming anybody but the system. ''As Vice-Chairman, I am also responsible.''

UNI