A postgraduate student of Ravenshaw University receives her degree from Odisha governor SC Jamir as Union HRD minister MM Pallam Raju (right) and vice-chancellor B.C. Tripathy (left) look on. Picture by Badrika Nath Das

Cuttack, July 2: Union minister of human resource development M.M. Pallam Raju today said universities across the country were not producing liberal thinkers.

Speaking at the sixth convocation of Ravenshaw University here, Raju said educational institutions had become centres of acknowledgement and not knowledge, producing one-dimensional persons.

“Universities should produce liberal thinkers, who would dedicate themselves to fight narrow sectarianism. We need minds that are ever active in quest for truth and sensitive to others’ suffering,” said Raju.

The Union minister said there was a need to strengthen higher education and facilitate research work since no university of India featured in top 200 global list.

“Parameters certainly differ but our faculty need to come up with world-class research publications, which is one of the yardsticks. At the same time, there is a need to cultivate the culture of research by the faculty to improve our rankings,” he said.

The UPA government has started a number of schemes to provide greater grants for educational institutions provided the universities raise their quality of education, he said.

The Right to Education Act was ensuring primary education in villages and the emphasis was on improving capacity in 173 backward educational blocks of Odisha.

“Ninety-six per cent villages in Odisha have been covered under the Right to Education and 23 crore children have been enrolled in various schools. Nearly 11 lakh students are being provided with mid-day meals in the country,” the minister said.

The authorities of Ravenshaw pitched for a central university status for the 146-year-old institution.