LUDHIANA, Nov 5: As Chief Election Commissioner M.S. Gill today outlined three clear cut strategies for building a new civilization and pointed out political and administrative failures of the successive governments at the annual convocation of Punjab Agricultural University here, hundreds of fresh graduates of the constituent colleges of the university sat in dharna at the main gate of the PAU and boycotted the convocation to protest the indifferent and apathetic attitude of the government towards agricultural graduates.In his convocation address, Gill said that highest priority should be accorded to achieve total literacy within a specific time frame, massive investment in infrastructure and initiating a programme to impart relevant technical education of superior kind.The university conferred the degree of doctor of science (honoris causa) on Gill for his significant contributions in designing and implementing the development agenda in the country especially in the field of agriculture, dairy farming, horticulture. Governor Punjab and Chancellor of the university B.K.N. Chhibber presented the degree to Gill.Gill emphasised on ensuring complete education for women and giving incentives to teachers to ensure that they stayed in villages. He said that infrastructure investment should have priority over consumption subsidies. Expressing serious concern over the rising liquor consumption in Punjab, Gill said during the period 1977-97, the sale of Punjab Medium Liquor had trebled and that of Indian Made Foreign Liquor had increased five times.Regarding the continuous decline in the size of land holdings in Punjab, Gill said that between 1981-91, the number of small farmers cultivating less than 5 acres had increased from 4 lakhs to 5 lakhs. As many as 80 per cent of the state farmers were unable to meet even the average economic status of Punjab. Unless the situation was checked immediately, there was bound to be renewed social tension. He called for developing alternatives to shift from rice to high value crops.``We cannot move to the 21st century and expect to stand along with the developed world with an illiterate population in poor physical shape.''Pointing out the pathetic state of economic management, the CEC said since mid 80s, Punjab growth rates were falling and were now well below the national average. The Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) growth had stagnated at an annual average of about 4-5 per cent. The sharpest decline in growth had been in agriculture where the rate had fallen to about 3.3 percent. ``We are falling behind the country, let no one imagine otherwise and we need to seriously think about our economic management''.He urged the planners to put a stop to ``unhealthy and impractical policies'' of granting sops and subsidies, both to the agricultural and industrial sectors. While subsidies in agriculture should be focussed only on small farmers with less than 7.5 acre holdings, the industrial policies should be restructured to ensure complete coordination with the neighbouring states and industry based on state's natural resource advantages should be attracted, he said.Vice-Chancellor Gurcharan Singh Kalkat, while presenting the report of the university, underlined the dire need for more investments in agricultural research and education for meeting the challenges faced by the society. He disclosed that the university had reoriented its research strategies to capitalise on the latest scientific advances.The university conferred degree of doctor of philosophy, M.Sc, M.Tech., M.V.Sc., MBA, and Master of Journalism. Various gold medals were also awarded. The cash awards for meritorious teacher, Dr M.S. Randhawa Best Book Award, Dr.Sukhdev Singh prize for essay and oration etc. were also presented.
