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Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has designated 3rd December,the birth anniversary of Dr.Rajendra Prasad, the first President of India, as Agricultural Education Day. In this connection, ICAR-CIARI, Port Blair is conducting a series of programmes for school and college students from 15 th November to 5th December, 2022. To begin with, a debate competition was held on 15th November for school students in which 82 students from 9 schools viz. Ummat Public School, Kamraj English Medium School, Khalsa Public School, Don Bosco School,GSSS, Port Mout, St. Mary’s School, Govt. Model Sr. Secondary School, Saraswathi Shishu Mandir, and Rabindra Bangla Vidyalaya participated. Two teams from each school debated in favour and against the topic “Whether agriculture, animal husbandry and fisheries are promising professional career or not?”.
On 16th November, a debate competition was held for college students in which 48 from 6 colleges viz. Pondicherry University, JNRM, Andaman Law College, ANCOL, DIET, and TGCE participated. Two teams from each college debated in favour and against the topic “Whether agricultural education in schools is necessary for the Islands under increasing urbanization scenario?”. Dr. Pooja Bohra, Scientist along with Shri Alex Praveen Barla, Smt. Asma Bibi, and Smt. Nutan Roy, Technical Assistants, Shri Ali Akbar, Technician, and Shri Saravanan, SSS coordinated the event.
Dr. S.K. Zamir Ahmed, Principal Scientist & Nodal officer of the programme, briefed the idea behind the conduct of debate under the aegis of Agriculture Education Day and expressed gratitude to the Principals of participant colleges for deputing their students. He summarized the deliberation of the debate by indicating that, agriculture should be given the status of mainstream subject in schools, resources and infrastructure should be created to establish agricultural college in the Islands for students to pursue agriculture courses after schooling, agriculture has to be viewed as a part of Island tourism and technology driven to make it more enterprising, and agricultural education will help inspire youth to pursue agricultural profession so as to sustain agriculture in the Islands in spite of burgeoning urbanization. Shri D.Karunakaran, Scientist & Organising Secretary proposed vote of thanks.
In continuation, painting and quiz competitions will be held on 18th and 21st November, respectively for school students. On 25th November, Dr. Lal Ji Singh, Joint Director & Head, Botanical Survey of India, Andaman & Nicobar Regional Centre will deliver a Seminar Lecture on “Floral diversity of Andaman & Nicobar Islands”. On 28th November, the Garacharma Campus of CIARI is open for the school students to visit its R&D activities. In addition, students can submit a Concept Paper on “Innovative ideas for agricultural development in the Islands” by 30th November. The highlight of this fortnightly programme is the Scientist-Student Interaction, wherein a team of Scientists will visit the schools to create awareness among the students about the “Career opportunities in agriculture and allied sectors” and to inculcate scientific temperament.
Organizing Secretaries Shri D. Karunakaran, @ 9433286866 and Dr. R. JayakumaraVaradan @ 8903974102 can be contacted for further details.