The Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) in association with Bhartiya Shikshan Mandal (BSM) inaugurated a lecture series on Bharat Bodh. The inauguration was done by Prakash Javadekar, Minister for HRD. He said: “The lectures should be conducted in a series all over India.” He also inaugurated the IGNOU Digi News of the University which shall be made available on its website for the entire IGNOU fraternity and its students and learners.
“All the philosophy and Indology students of colleges should attend this lecture series. People don’t know about India. We should know the true identity of our own country. Knowledge Tradition and Practices of India, which is a course in CBSE taught in Class XI and XII, teaches India’s culture from ayurveda to science. We will replicate such courses with NCERT because we think our true identity begins with the identity of our nation. Without knowing it, we will not be able to decipher the truth about the world,” Javadekar said.
Talking the initiative forward, Vice Chancellor of IGNOU, Prof Ravindra Kumar said: “The university shall soon launch a new formal academic programme called Certificate course in Bharat Bodh. This will talk about the cultural wealth of India and will also take a critical look at it. We will not take everything for granted and critically examine it and whatever is valuable we will retain it.”
Throwing light on the series of lectures, Kumar said: “It will be an interactive series where we will invite people to raise questions, issues and debates from all over India with the help of our regional centres having nationwide presence. A lot of traditional wisdom is available in our country which is untapped. We have to make a syllabus which is India centric.”
Bharatiya Shikshan Mandal’s secretary of organising committee, Mukul Kanitkar referred to teaching of Swami Vivekanand who through his various books and lectures tried explaining meaning of Bharat and what constitutes and binds this great country.
Where Prof HR Nagendra, founder vice chancellor of Swami Vivekananda Yoga Anusandhana Samsthana dwelt upon the science that is Yoga, Swami Atmapriyananda, vice chancellor of Ramakrishna Mission Vivekanada University talked about the oneness of human beings.