Prof Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director, IIT Madras (right) and founder and Chancellor of VIT, Dr G Viswanathan during its 36th annual convocation held virtually on September 28. (Photo Courtesy: VIT)
Dimapur, September 28 (MExN): The Vellore Institute of Technology (VIT), Vellore conducted its 36th annual convocation virtually on September 28 with Prof Bhaskar Ramamurthi, Director, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras as chief guest.
A total of 7,569 undergraduate, postgraduate students, and research scholars graduated this year, stated a press release from the VIT.
Delivering the convocation address virtually, Prof Ramamurthi urged students to dive deep into at least some of the subjects if not all, during their formal education and learn how to get to the core of the concepts involved in them.
“To use a familiar Indian description, one should aim for vidwat in at least a few subjects. But how do we know which ones to do this in, which subjects are likely to be useful in one’s career? Well, one cannot know this; and the curious thing is, it does not matter. What the effort itself does, irrespective of the subject is to teach one how to delve deep, how to know when one has understood the core underlying concepts well, and how to recognize when one is slowly but surely becoming a vidwan,” he said.
The professor further maintained that India that is poised at a very unique moment in her history and the next 30 years are going to be one of great transformation.
“This period is going to be like no other from the past, and therefore you will need to be alert to the unbelievable opportunities that are going to come your way,” he told the graduates.
Delivering his Presidential address, Founder and Chancellor of VIT Dr G Viswanathan said that out of the eligible 14 crore youth in India, only 4 crore get the opportunity to go for higher education.
Listing out the challenges in higher education, he said that shortage of teachers, low input for research, and inadequate industry linkages had made India lag behind other countries like Japan, China, South Korea, etc.
“Higher education system in India is crippled with the lack of financial, academic, and administrative autonomy granted to institutions,” he said.
Meanwhile, Dr Viswanathan informed that last year, 844 national and international companies took part in VIT’s campus placement.
He also urged students to become employers rather than employees.
VIT Vice Presidents Sankar Viswanathan, Dr Sekar Viswanathan, and GV Selvam; Vice-Chancellor D Rambabu Kodali; Pro-Vice Chancellor Dr S Narayanan; and Registrar Dr K Sathiyanarayanan, VIT also took part in the convocation, the release added.
