Vice-Chancellor, Punjab Agricultural University, ludhiana, Dr BS Dhillon expressed the need of increasing agricultural production to ensure food availability and food access to the growing population. He was speaking as the chief guest at the inaugural function of a two-day National Seminar on Reorientation of Agricultural Research to ensure National Food Security at Chaudhary Charan Singh Haryana Agricultural University (CCS HAU), Hisar on Monday. The seminar is organised by Directorate of Research of the University in collaboration with Department of Science and Technology, Government of India in which nearly 400 agricultural scientists and corporate officials across the country are participating.
Talking about overall agricultural scenario of the country, he said that squeezing cultivable land area, declining natural resources and soil fertility and climate change were posing a threat to agriculture production. He said there was need to develop such agriculture technologies that apart from dealing with these challenges were also capable of increasing productivity of different crops, fruits and vegetables. Presiding over the function, Vice-Chancellor CCSHAU, Dr. K.S. Khokhar said that in 1950 when India's population was just 36 crore and foodgrain production was 50 million tonnes, the country had to import nearly five million tonnes of foodgrains. But our efforts had achieved nearly five times increase in food production. likewise, there had been significant increase in horticulture crops, milk, fish and egg production in the country.
14 teams in Eco-Marathon Asia 2014
Jalandhar: Fourteen student teams, representing 12 universities across India, are preparing to hit the streets of Manila, Philippines in February 2014 to compete in the fifth year of Shell Eco-marathon Asia. Three out of these teams representing lovely Professional University, Phagwara; National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar and Chitkara Institute of Engineering & Technology, Rajpura are from Punjab. Speaking about Shell Eco-marathon Asia 2014, Dr. Yasmine Hilton, Chairman Shell Companies in India said, "Through Shell Eco-marathon, we are able to bring together current and future leaders on a single global platform to think about sustainable solutions to the world's energy challenge". For this year's event in Manila, student teams from India will field 11 Prototype and three Urban Concept vehicles, powered by gasoline, diesel, battery and hydrogen. "Initiatives such as Shell Eco-marathon can be a big leap in solving future energy issues. We are very excited about our design and look forward to the challenge in Manila", said Vikas Kumar Sharma, team captain, National Institute of Technology, Jalandhar.
PU Handball team is Runners-up
Chandigarh: Panjab University, Chandigarh Handball (Men) Team has won Runners-up Position in the All India Inter Zonal Inter University Handball (Men) tournament, held at Rajasthan University, Jaipur. In the Team Championship first four teams from each zone i.e. North, East, South, West & Central Zone participated in the All India Inter Zonal Inter University Handball (Men) tournament. In the quarterfinal match PU beat MDU, Rohtak by 30-21, In the Semi-final match PU beat Kurukshetra University by 35-27 and in the closely fought Final match PU lost to Rajsthan University, Jaipur by 28-32. PU Director of Physical Education, Dr. Dalwinder Singh said that Deepak Sharma was the Captain of the team and other players included Sahil Sharma, Barjesh, Surinder, Puneet Singh lali, Amandeep Singh, Tarun Thakur, Kumar Vasishth, among others. Gurcharan Singh was the coach of team.