Tura, Oct 19: Meghalaya Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Thursday said the youth are the greatest assets and resource of the State, and the Government is committed to ensure that the potential of the youth is harnessed to its optimum.
“It is our duty as a Government to ensure that we keep the youngsters right at the centre of what we are trying to do for our State… sometimes Government focuses too much on scheme based governance… scheme based governance is a very, very narrow way of looking at things because when you look at a scheme, you only want to implement the scheme… and you don’t understand the purpose of implementing the scheme. However, we keep the youth in front of us and make the decision,” he said.
It is the responsibility of all the stakeholders involved to play their part in ensuring that every young person is nurtured and guided to become productive, committed, patriotic, discipline and god-fearing citizen, he said while addressing at the Golden Jubilee celebration of the Meghalaya Board of School Education (MBoSE).
The three day grand celebration of the MBoSE, which concluded on Thursday, was also attended by Education Minister, Rakkam A Sangma, Chief Secretary D.P. Wahlang, amongst other dignitaries and officials from different parts of the State.
“Meghalaya is a small State as compared to other states in the country like Uttar Pradesh; so, in order for the State to be at the crest of success and development, we have to make sure that we produce quality personnel in order to compete and contribute for the growth and development of the State,” he remarked, while enlightening the gathering on the State’s ambitious plan to be amongst the Top 10 states in the country.
He also acknowledged the contributions of the founder and the leaders, who despite several challenges had conceptualised to start the board in 1973, while the State was young after being carved out of Assam.
Talking about numerous challenges in the education sector, he said “The education sector is currently facing numerous challenges but it should not deter us to strive to make our education sector one of the topmost in the country. We have initiated intervention to better the infrastructure and learning curve in the elementary as well as higher secondary section.”
He further urged all the stakeholders involved including administrators, teachers, students and especially parents to strive developing young persons who are nurtured and guided to become productive.
Speaking on the occasion, Education Minister Rakkam A. Sangma, said, “There is no precise device to measure the quality of an individual other than through education. I look forward to the leadership of our Chief Minister in furthering the development of education in the State.”
Chief Secretary D. P. Wahlang, said, “The journey of MBoSE has been long like a football match. At halftime MBoSE was restructured in 2006 since its inception in 1973. Now at 2023, we are celebrating 50 years. The first board exam of MBoSE took place in 1974 and less than 3800 examinees and has had a quantum jump more than 80,000 both in the metric and class XII exams.”
He further pointed that State’s literacy rate has changed dramatically from 24.49% to 80 % till date with the increase in educational institutions from 40-50 to 2923 schools affiliated to MBoSE of which 18166 are secondary schools and 421 are higher secondary schools.
