Lokayukta B.S. Patil, rued erosion of values in society and said that a sizeable section of government employees were falling into the trap of greed as evident in frequent raids and recovery of ill-gotten wealth from them.
Delivering the convocation address of the Karnataka State Open University (KSOU) here on Sunday, Justice Patil, deviated from the prepared speech and said that a substantial number of employees were falling prey to characterlessness and greed. Mr.Patil made these remarks while espousing the importance of values and character building to the new graduates.
He remarked that most employees have nothing much to declare by way of wealth at the time of entering the government service but when they are trapped and caught the value of the properties seized exceeds crores of rupees. It is time for youngsters to inculcate good values and help in social transformation and nation building with a value-based society, said Justice Patil.
The Lokayukta also emphasised the need to excel and said that it was one of the duties of the graduates to strive to achieve excellence in their area of sphere. Individual excellence, he said, leads to collective excellence which will take nation to great heights. Education is not a mere tool for skill building but is also an instrument to help individuals to evolve into better humans, said Justice Patil.
The 19th convocation of the KSOU saw women outnumbering men in qualifying to receive their graduation and post-graduation degrees.
While 7869 students qualified to receive their degree certificates in various courses, 4471 of them were women. While three research scholars were awarded their Ph.D. – one in Kananda, one in History, and one in Political Sciences, 30 students received gold medals and 37 students received cash prizes. In addition, an honorary doctorate was conferred on H.C. Sathyan, State Information Commissioner, K.M.Veeresh, president, Bapuji Education Trust, Chitradurga and Meera Shivalingaiah, Secretary, S.B. Education Trust, Mandya.
The Minister for Higher Education M.C. Sudhakar said that the KSOU was mired in difficulties till a few years ago as a result of which it was unable to issue degrees to a lot of students of that batch. But the open varsity was not stepping into a new era having secured A+ grade from NAAC and it will help start a new chapter, he added.
The Minister also said that the emphasis on skills and employability was in demand to suit which it was imperative to make suitable changes to the syllabus and the government was working towards it.
The KSOU Vice Chancellor Prof. Sharanappa V. Halse said that securing an A+ grade from NAAC was a significant milestone for the varsity as a result of which the admissions increased to over 50,000 last year alone. Furthermore, the UGC-Distance Education Bureau has approved 45 offline programmes and 10 online programmes for KSOU and it was a record for any open varsity in the country.
Governor Thaawar Chand Gehlot, members of the board of management, academic council and others were present.
