Sambalpur: An 81-year-old retired officer of the rural development department has taken admission in the Odisha Open University's Bhubaneswar centre.

The varsity's vice-chancellor Srikant Mohapatra, while interacting with the learners, said: "There is no age limit for acquiring knowledge. The old man, Sarat Chandra Patnaik, a retired class I officer of the rural development department, has enrolled himself to study the rural development course."

Patnaik had secured his BA degree from Berhampur University in 1973.

"See for yourself the interest of the old man. At this age, Patnaik wants to study and acquire more knowledge. He is sincere in his studies. He told me that as he was writing fast, the teachers were not able to read his handwriting," the VC said, while narrating his experience of meeting Patnaik. He has successfully served 40 years in his department.

Mohapatra said he had gone through his answer papers. He added so many extra pages in his answer sheets, but due to age problem and fast writing, his hand writing was not clear for the teachers to evaluate. "I am proud of such a student. At this age, he is attending classes," Mohapatra said. He said the Open University would start a master's degree in cyber security from the next academic session. "We have applied to the UGC for allowing us to open the cyber security course in our university," he said, adding: "I am not in favour of opening courses without the approval of the UGC. I do not want to provide unrecognised certificate to students."

He said the students enrolled in the Open University were taking keen interest in their studies. For the first time, the VC had organised the interaction session to get feedback from the learners in the presence of teachers. Most of the students took part in the interactive session, praised the courses and requested the VC to open more job-oriented courses.

Teachers Lakshmi Meher, Subhas Panigrahi, Satyanarayan Bhoi, Pruthibiraj Mishra and course co-ordinator Mahendra Behera spoke on various aspects of teachings and its impact on students. Students requested the VC to include more practical classes and field study programmes. Pratap Kumar Das, a journalism student, said the course was so much interesting that his wife had also taken admission in it from this session.