Independence Day 2014: Our USR

Members of the UoH Community,

My warmest good wishes to all on the occasion of the nation’s 68th Independence Day. Each year we collect to celebrate our independence, and to reaffirm our belief in the democratic values that hold us together as a country, even as we find our regional boundaries changing.

This is the first Independence Day celebration for the University of Hyderabad as we find ourselves located in the new state of Telangana. The transformation comes with new hopes and fresh challenges, even as we strive to find our feet in the new circumstances. One thing is clear, we are the premier research University of the new state, and we must pay our role to educate and we must fulfill our destiny, to educate, to enable, and to liberate.

The sense of liberation offered by education was beautifully captured by the students of our University at a recent show that they had, at the Salar Jung Museum. The title of the show was (taken from two lines from a poem, The moon is a kite) How strong the Breeze, How precious the Flight.

The University is committed to providing a strong breeze- sometimes as a strong gust that pushes you off your feet, sometimes as a tornado, that churns up your thoughts and makes you re-evaluate your positions, and sometimes as that strong but gentle wind that slowly moulds your ideas and passions into values that will last. The winds of change blow gentle sometimes, but often not, and the University is a place where we willingly enter to experience that change.

And the flight- how valuable it is when truly earned! The degrees are just one small part of it: the true value of the education that the University provides comes in the opportunities it gives to change ones life. And as so many of our students have discovered, sometimes while they are here, but more often after they have left, the University is a great springboard that can help you to reach as high as you want to. The wings you earn at the University will allow you to soar as high as your ambitions can take you.

In terms of resources, the past year has been a difficult one: we have had to bear the full brunt of the economic downturn. Our funding has been way below what we have needed, and indeed below the level that a University such as ours merits. We have been ranked among the top universities in India for the year 2014 in three independent surveys, by India Today, The Week and Careers 360. Ours is among the best Universities in the country and always ranked number one in the South. The NAAC puts us consistently at the top end of their scale. When excellence is recognized, it also needs to be nurtured, so we can only hope that with the change in the scenario at the centre, there will be some relief on this front for us all.

But there are things that we can justifiably be proud of. Our faculty and students have been recognized nationally and internationally for their research. One significant feature of our research over the years is the growth of the applied component – the number of patents that are filed and that are awarded have been increasing steadily.

I think that this is a welcome development, that the work that is done in the University should be more applicable and relevant to our society, to our times. Our University- as we all widely recognize- is a haven, a refuge that provides a wonderful environment in which we can pursue our academic and intellectual activities. We are very fortunate to be able to live and work here, and I believe we all appreciate the deep privilege that we have.

It is important that we should reflect upon how we can give back to the society that nurtures us. For many years now, there has been the notion of a “Corporate Social Responsibility”, recognition that any entity, particularly a corporation that makes profit, has both a social and a moral responsibility to the society in which it exists. We must pay attention to the manner in which we use public resources, else those very resources will be irretrievably lost to us by overuse and misuse. In our country, this social responsibility or CSR has been quantified, and on 1 April this year, the government of India implemented new CSR guidelines requiring companies to spend 2% of their net profit on social development.

What Social Responsibility does a University- our University say- have? We have usually answered this question implicitly, be it by doing what other universities do, by responding to directives that come from time to time from the outside, by admitting students from a wide spectrum of backgrounds, by having policies, explicit or implicit, that address a range of abilities.

Today I would like to suggest that we must take the opportunity to make our University Social Responsibility – our USR if you will- explicit. We must look more closely at the real needs of our society and each segment of our UoH community can do its own bit to address these needs. To start with, let us remember that our campus is in our custodianship, and we must nurture it carefully to provide a lung for the city. Our lakes must add to the water table. Our campus should be a refuge, not just for us, but also for the flora and fauna of Telengana, for the region. We should be careful keepers of the land and not owners or exploiters. This is a responsibility that devolves upon us all- the students, the teachers, and the staff- as we live and breathe here.

Our teachers share the USR in the most fundamental ways- we must live up to our label of being a research University, the best in the country. Our research must strive to be applicable and useful, and there is not an area of enquiry that does not have a chance of being so. Application is not just a matter of patents and products- research that opens our eyes, teaches us new perspectives, gives us new vision, new ideas- all these come from any field, and it is imperative that we make this our responsibility in as explicit a manner as possible.

But beyond that, we must participate in society more meaningfully. Opening our doors to as many students who can be accommodated is one- for every student here, there are almost 20 who could not be here. We therefore must address this need as soon as possible, and as effectively as possible. USR would suggest that we need to evolve at least as much as our society is evolving, in what we teach, how we teach it, and how we prepare our students to cope effectively with the India that is just outside our walls, and the India that lies beyond, both in space and in time.

Interacting with the city and beyond the limits of Hyderabad is important, especially in this day when local and global are so interchangeable and mixed into one another. Holding our conferences in the city- as the IAMCR that we concluded last month, the Dynamics Days conference that we held in Chennai, or the Women’s World Congress that we will have next week- is one way. Integrating into the fabric of our city, state or country in as involved a way as possible is another feature of what I see as our USR, and doubtless there are other ways that will occur to each one of us.

There is nothing very new in this. We have long used our truly national days- 26 January and 15 August- to reflect upon our journey as a nation, and to set agendas for the future. The social responsibility that I am alluding to today has always been a part of our consciousness, especially when we realize how fortunate we all feel to live in a free country, and in a society which, while imperfect, has sound democratic values. For long our gaze has been an inward one, which looks at our rights and privileges. We need also to turn it outward, and look at our responsibilities as a University, as we help to create the India of the future, the India that we all dream of: an India of prosperity, an India of progress, and an India of equality.

Jai Hind!

I Day, 2013

The country’s 67’th, my third, and the Kendriya Vidyalaya, University of Hyderabad’s first. Some excerpts from my speech today:

Members of the UoH Family, Let me start by first conveying my warm wishes and greetings on the occasion of the 66th anniversary of our nation’s Independence.

Today we are- as we have been for the past many years- living in interesting times. We appear to be in a state of perpetual flux, with the scenario changing frequently in dimensions that are political, economic, and with consequences of an immediate, as well as of a long-ranging nature.

Combining independence with responsibility has been a challenge not just for our campus, but metaphorically, for our nation as well. The day of independence that we celebrate or mark each year, brought the nation the responsibility of forging a modern state, one where all citizens could aspire to a life that was better, because it was free, and because we had self-determination and self-governance, swaraj. In the nearly seven decades that have passed, it is clear that we have tried hard and that we have made great strides, but it is also clear that we have far to go on so many fronts.

This is the third time I have stood here to speak on this occasion, and since last year there have been many changes that we have seen happening around us. As anticipated, the XII plan grant has not been as generous as we had wanted, but there have been rays of hope and promise on many fronts. The University has had a preeminent position in the country with respect to its commitment to excellence in research and teaching. Having seen it intimately these past years, I know that the foundation is very solid, and the base is a strong one. In the past month, in recognition of the fact that twice the UGC has declared us to be a University with the potential for excellence, we are now designated simply as University of Excellence. This is not to say that all the potential has been realized- we more than others are acutely aware of the many miles we have to traverse and the many goals we need to score- but still, we are I believe, a University with the Promise of Excellence. This appellation comes with a heavy responsibility, and that is the responsibility to continue to deliver in the future, as we have in the past, good students, good programs, and good, solid research.

Our faculty and students have been recognized nationally and internationally- this year’s Amartya Sen award, the SCOPUS young scientist award, the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Award, the B M Birla Award, several KVRSS awards, AP State Football championship… the list is a long one.

Similarly, many individual disciplines have been recognized for their excellence as well. PURSE, the programme of the DST for Promotion of University Research and Scientific Excellence will shortly enter its second phase, our Centre for Research and Education in Biology and Biotechnology or CREBB, similarly, is up for renewal and extension. A crucial and significant new addition to the University is the School of Education that has been granted recently by the UGC. I believe that with the addition of this important discipline, we will be able to make progress in a crucial dimension, the marriage of instruction with technology. I see that in the coming years we will be able to reach out to larger and larger numbers of our fellow citizens in the country and thereby fulfill the responsibility that we all share, namely of educating the bulk of the country to create a modern state.

Our concerns are many. As I have mentioned on earlier occasions, we are blessed to occupy this campus, this environment, this land. Our efforts to secure the land for the future of the University and for the purposes of education are still on: that road is a long and tortuous one, strewn with unexpected hurdles, but it is one that we are firmly committed to. For this purpose, we now have a detailed master plan for the campus.

Our commitment to the environment extends to the preservation of the biodiversity, of the varied habitats, of the fauna and flora, the lakes the rocks. One achievement that attracted considerable national attention is our action of using the roof of the Library for harvesting solar power and making this building almost self-sufficient and independent of the state electricity power supply. This coming year we will do more, and while we reduce our expenditure on power, we will also contribute to building a greener campus. And a more sensitive campus as well. The Ministry for Social Empowerment has responded positively to our disability audit, and our request to make all our buildings accessible to disabled students, and in the first instance they have funded us to do so for sixteen of the main academic buildings. Our lakes remain a source of concern, and our efforts to clean them, deepen them, and improve the ground water resources in this part of the city are also always afoot. Similarly, our campus has been invaded by the subabool tree species in a manner that is harming the native flora of this part of the Telangana region. These need careful culling and replacement, and we will undertake to do this shortly.

Within the University administration there have been many attempts to streamline procedures, and one effort that promises to serve us well is the decision to advance the entrance exams, and to make the admissions more transparent. The intake this year exceeds that of last year, and many more students have been able to apply for the several courses that we offer, although it is also true that the process needs further fine tuning.

But above all, if there is one thing that I would wish for us, it is for an increased self-confidence. We are a good, solid university, and we offer a quality of education that is difficult to come by, facilities that are well above what can be found elsewhere, superb teachers and a cohort of students that is second to none. And yet, there is a strange diffidence that permeates our functioning, something that is difficult to fathom. We are very good by any set of standards, except perhaps by our own. And this, while it should help us to reach even higher levels, appears to pull us back and hampers our own growth, both physical and intellectual. The responsibility of independence, of autonomy, is one that cannot be taken too lightly. Of late the University has been portrayed in somewhat negative light in the press and media, and I believe undeservedly so. The onus of making ours a University of Excellence is a shared one, shared by all sections of our campus community, staff, students, faculty alike. Each has a role to play, and each has one’s own sphere of operation. I urge all of you to play your roles with utmost seriousness- losing sight of our ultimate goals causes us to drift, and ultimately lets us all down. We need to change this, and now more than ever, we need to be the change we wish to see.

But this should happen gradually, with deliberation, and with debate. And with wide participation so that each voice can be heard. To adapt something that I said recently in a related context, if we are to bring about lasting change in education and research in our University, there really is no alternative to slow and sustained effort. The race, such as it is, is not always to the swift. It is to those that persevere.

Jai Hind!

… very Heaven!

My Independence Day speech, 2012:

Members of the University family, students, faculty, officers, staff, colleagues. Greeting on the occasion of our 66th Independence Day.

Every year this day we look to a new year of our Independence with renewed hope. Hope for a better future for our children and ourselves.

During the last few days, seeing the physical beauty of our campus- its greenery and its lakes- I have repeatedly been drawn to a fragment of a poem by Wordsworth, written at the time of the French Revolution- a time of hope and expectations. The poem captures the idealism of a time, and one that is good to recall today, particularly given the large number of young people here.

Oh! pleasant exercise of hope and joy!

For mighty were the auxiliars which then stood

Upon our side, we who were strong in love!

Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,

But to be young was very heaven! Oh! times,

In which the meagre, stale, forbidding ways

Of custom, law, and statute, took at once

The attraction of a country in romance!

Our freedom has brought us huge possibilities, but it has also come with a huge responsibilities. And huge challenges. One responsibility that I am especially sensitive to comes from our privileged position on a campus of such beauty, in a University where the major part of ones day is devoted to intellectual pursuit. We are blessed to be in this learning environment, blessed that we can enjoy the several freedoms we have. Blessed, one can say, to be allowed to do the things that we care so deeply about.

But with this privilege comes responsibility, in particular, the responsibility to contribute at the highest level that we can. As members of the University family, we represent a vanishingly small fraction of the population of this country that has this privilege. The privilege of being educated, of having the resources that we do, of being able to think what we can, how we can, and when we can. The investment that our country has made in us, both implicitly and explicitly is tremendous, and the hope they have that we will deliver is also ever present, and something we need to acknowledge. The country has invested in itself by investing in us, it has invested in its future by investing in us now. The important thing is that we do the very best that we can to keep the faith, and that we strive to deliver our very best- in any field of intellectual endeavour.

This is not always easy. We live, regrettably, in interesting times. Each day brings new and unexpected challenges, particularly on matters that relate to governance and policy. The past year has seen our fortunes fluctuate, especially on matters relating to funding. The economic downturn has meant that the funds that will be made available through the UGC for the 12th plan will not match the promises that were made, but nevertheless it should be possible for the University to consolidate, to improve the infrastructure and to strengthen our various academic programs. The lower funding levels, though, come with the need for sacrifice. Well, if not quite sacrifice, this comes with the need for fiscal discipline and a leanness in spending. We have to make our funds stretch to help us reach the goals of excellence that we aim for, we need to spend wisely, and to use our grants well.

While new infrastructure will slowly become available, it is also true that what we have built up over the last 40 or so years is now in sore need of maintenance. It is our collective responsibility to ensure that the facilities that have been developed be kept functional. Likewise this campus of ours- blessed are we that live here, but more blessed are those who can preserve it! I have, over the past year, been particularly sensitive to matters relating to the environment, to water, and to the campus fauna and flora. With the Hyderabad Metro Rail, we have undertaken a massive tree plantation drive, and with the GHMC, an ambitious plan to improve the water bodies on campus, to increase their number as well as their carrying capacity. This will, I hope, serve us well in the future. Similarly, our recent drives to clear the campus, manage the waste and build a sustainable program for its ongoing maintenance are in this same direction. It needs all of sections of the University to participate, and I look forward to your contributions in this endeavor.

This campus is ours. Ours to enjoy, ours to nurture, ours to nourish. We need to know it well- this is the only way in which we can know well what it needs. Walking through it- as we did earlier this year, and will do again this afternoon- is one way. Caring about it and caring for it, is another. Beyond the slogan, “Mana Campus, Mana Hridayam” we need to develop a sense of ownership of this campus.

Our university- while being central- is also an integral part of our local environment. I have often stressed that we are not just a University of Hyderabad, we are a University for Hyderabad… I hope that we will see more efforts in the coming year to integrate us in the city. Our campus radio station is a year old today- this is a very important way in which we reach out to the communities that sustain us, and an important way in which we can give back to those that sustain us. But there are other ways in which we can and should integrate. We need to have more engagement with the city, with issues that are current and relevant, with discussion and debate. Some of our campus events have been shared with the city, music, theatre, lectures, but we need more.

Let me close with reiterating what I said last year, that we need to carve out a set of freedoms for ourselves. In particular, we need to hold dear to the freedom to excel. Too often, we perform to the levels set by others and achieve goals set by governments. As academics, we know that the best standards are internal, set by the disciplines themselves. We need the freedom to pursue such ideals, without fear or favour, without interference from anybody else. Be Excellent!

Once again my greetings on the occasion of Independence Day to all of you. Jai Hind!