Fostering The Ability To Think Should Be the Prime Aim Of The Education System, says Prof Dr RS Deshpande
Pune, 22nd March 2024: Curiosity and thinking ability are nearly dead in today’s education system and a good education system should always imbibe in students the ability to think and create something new, said Prof. Dr.R.S.Deshpanade, former Director, the Institute of social change ( ISEC).
He was speaking at the book launch ceremony organised at the Department of Economics at Savitribai Phule Pune University. The books, The Unparalleled Economist: Prof.V.M. Dandekar compiled by Prof Dr. Vilas Adhav and his colleagues at the department and Maharashtra’s Agriculture: The purposefully neglected sector written by Vilas Adhav, Khalil Shah and R.S.Deshpande were launched at the event in the presence of Dr Parag Kalkar, Pro-VC ( SPPU), Prof.Raosaheb Kasabe, the eminent thinker and social scientist, Dr Deshpande and Dr Adhav, HoD, Department of economics (SPPU).
Speaking at the programme, Raosaheb Kasabe said, VM Dandekar was one of the greatest economists our country can have. His ability to be straightforward, and speak truth made him a distinguished economist. He further added that the world is grappling with various issues and the root cause of these problems is capitalism. Capitalism lived for 600 years, and one of the positive things which made capitalism win the race against communism was its ability to adapt to changing times. But in the recent past, it has lost its ability to adapt, and globalisation is the latest face of capitalism, he added. He also stated that capitalism always lures the man by its inherent ability to allow him to see dreams. To state his point of how capitalism is driving politics across the globe he gave an example of Biden being the first leader to visit Israel after its conflict with Hamas just because the USA’s politics is influenced by top industrialists who are Jewish.
Dr Deshpande, who was involved with the government of Karnataka to frame its agriculture policies, while speaking at the event said that in Maharashtra various committees were formed to recommend the policies to take its agriculture sector out of perils but due to the inability of successive governments to implement the recommendations has made agriculture the purposefully neglected sectors in Maharashtra. He also added that despite Maharashtra being developed in various aspects contributing to the growth of agriculture, the state stands at the top in farmers’ suicides. Effective Policy implementation can solve the problem to a maximum extent he further added.
Prof.Dr. Vilas Adhav who is among one of the writers of the books said that it was always his Dream to compile the thoughts of Prof.V.M Dandekar, the greatest economist of his time. He also added that students need to critically analyze the thoughts they are exposed to in the current era shaped by Modern technology and social media.
