Minority and higher education percent to be attained: Basu

Kolkata, Apr 26 (UNI) Expressing gratitude at being conferred the honorary Doctor of Law, veteran Marxist Jyoti Basu said he hoped to see a rise in the education rate among the Muslims and West Bengal cross the national percentage for higher education.

Addressing the audience at a special convocation ceremony of Calcutta University where he was conferred the honorary Doctor of Law, Honoris Causa, Mr Basu said, '' The national percentage of higher education is nine per cent and that of developing countries is 11.3 per cent. We should at least cross the national barrier and hoped CU will lead the way in this regard.'' Talking about the rate of education among the minority community, he said it needed a vast growth from the current rate of 8.19 per cent, though there has been a big increase in the number of Madrasas.

He said that leadership should be taken in establishing more centres of excellence in state, though it already had one in West Bengal University of Jurisdical Sciences. He also advocated more thrusts in the field of Bio-technology, Genetics, Bio-Chemistry and Bio-Informatics.

'' Our universities should be centres of innovation and performance and the means to the end. There has to be constant dialogues between scientists, social scientists and technologists.

It is through this balanced development that we can establish a knowledge society and Calcutta University, which is one of the top five universities in the world, will have to be the leader,'' he said While Mr Basu quoted Swami Vivekananda and Rabindranath Tagore to point the centre of perfect education, he quoted Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru stating the university should be centre for humanism, tolerance and a place for adventure of ideas and temple of truth far away from world of bigotry and falsehood.

He hoped that the Calcutta University will not only be an ivory tower for imparting education, but be socially committed to the people of the country.

The university should fulfill the social goal with a social-political-economic process and form a part of social progress.

Earlier, in the convocation address Vice-Chancellor Asish Kr Banerjee addressed Mr Basu '' as a distinguished political leader who has devoted his life for the uplift of the of the downtrodden and has played a pivotal role in the state's socio-economic development.'' " By honouring Mr Basu we are honouring the long tradition of mass struggle for economic uplift of the poor and downtrodden of the country. The University wants to recognise Mr Basu's contribution to his process in the state of West Bengal," he said.

Chancellor and Governor of West Bengal Gopal Krishna Gandhi also heaped praise on the humanist in Mr Basu and his contribution for socialism calling him "unique".

UNI