The National Law University Odisha, in collaboration with the Union department of justice and the United Nations Development Programme, organised an international conference titled Rethinking Socially Relevant Legal Education: Best Practices and a Way Forward. The conference was organised to emphasis what law schools had done so far to make legal education socially relevant and identified what needs to be done in course of time.

Lifetime award

Damodar Acharya, educator and chairman of the advisory board of Siksha ‘O’ Anusandhan University, was recently honoured with the lifetime achievement award. Minister Prafulla Samal presented the award to Acharya in the presence of ST and SC development minister Ramesh Chandra Majhi. National Service Scheme co-ordinator of the varsity Nachiketa Sharma was also presented the Visvesvaraya Prativa Samman in the same event.

KISS feat

There is mention of the Kalinga Institute of Social Sciences (KISS), Bhubaneswar, in popular textbooks used in introductory anthropology and cultural anthropology courses in USA as the institute has the world’s largest anthropology laboratory. The findings of a research on the institute has now featured in two textbooks, namely Window on Humanity-A Concise Introduction to Anthropology and Mirror for Humanity-A Concise Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (8th edition) written by Conrad Philip Kottak.

Media event

The Institute of Media Studies in Bhubaneswar recently organised a workshop on Corporate Media: A Threat to Democracy. Senior journalist Sandeep Sahu said that after liberalisation of economy in 1991, investments flooded into the media sector from private companies and over the years, the independent editorial policy had been replaced with marketing policy of the organisation.

Student seminar

The Odisha BPUT Students’ Association recently organised a seminar titled Industrialisation in Odisha and Employment. Former finance minister Parfulla Chandra Ghadei said engineers’ contribution in the development of a nation was invaluable and they should be given importance. He said Odias should be given priority in employment in the industries of the state.

Corporate quiz

The National Thermal Power Corporation emerged winner of the Bhubaneswar regional round of Tata Crucible Corporate Quiz, 2017. The quiz will traverse 25 cities in India. About 50 teams from prominent corporate organisations across Bhubaneswar took part in the event.

Anwesha Ambaly