Agartala: Chief Minister Prof. Dr. Manik Saha today said that the gap in the quality of education between cities and villages has been reduced to a great extent due to the steps taken by the state government for the development of the education sector.
“The state government is working by adopting a plan to reach education to the marginalized areas through the use of modern technology,” he said.
Chief Minister Professor (Dr.) Manik Saha said this while inaugurating the state-level birth anniversary celebration of Pandit Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, organized by the School Education Department and the Information and Cultural Affairs Department at Muktadhara Auditorium today.
At the beginning of the programme, the guests paid tribute by garlanding the portrait of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar.
While discussing the personal life, career and philosophy of Pandit Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar at the programme, the Chief Minister said that Vidyasagar was an educationist, social reformer, humanist and one of the pioneers of Bengali prose.
“Vidyasagar made the Bengali script easy to read. Because of him, the tremendous development of the Bengali language has been possible. He was given the title of Vidyasagar for his profound scholarship in Sanskrit language and literature. Vidyasagar, besides being educated himself, believed in the ideology of educating everyone else. His works, Sita Vanvas, Kathamala and Varnaparichay, are invaluable assets of Bengali literature,” he said.
The Chief Minister said that Vidyasagar played an important role in removing superstitions like sati and child marriage from society and creating a healthy society, and gave special importance to the promotion of women’s education.
“To this end, he established schools for girls in various districts of West Bengal. Because he believed that the development of any nation or country is never possible without the development of girls,” he said.
The Chief Minister also said in his speech that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is always in favour of maintaining old traditions along with modernity.
“Therefore, equal importance has been given to old traditions along with modernity in the National Education Policy,” he said.
The Chief Minister told the teachers and those present at the event that schools should be developed as centres for talent development.
Discussing the various steps taken by the state government to improve the education system in the state, the Chief Minister said that so far, Rs 1,178 crore has been spent on the infrastructure development of 213 schools in the state.
On the occasion, Director of the Information and Cultural Affairs Department Bimbisar Bhattacharya, Director of the School Education Department Dr. Samit Roy Chowdhury and others were present.
