Srinagar: A seven-day training programme for officers of National Service Scheme (NSS) from different degree colleges of Jammu and Kashmir concluded at the University of Kashmir on Saturday.
Divisional Commissioner Kashmir Mr Pandurang K Pole was the chief guest at the valedictory session, where Vice-Chancellor Prof Talat Ahmad was a guest of honour and Registrar Dr Nisar Ahmad a special guest.
The training programme, second of its kind this year, was organised by the varsity’s NSS.
In his presidential remarks, Mr Pole said the volunteerism generated by the NSS across the country infuses in students a sense of selfless service towards the society apart from leading to their personality development based on the virtues of discipline, compassion and mutual respect.
He urged the NSS team to evolve a mechanism whereby its volunteers would organise year-long camps in villages in their catchment areas to help address social and environmental concerns specific to each such village.
“Doing so would lead to better diagnosis and understanding of problems at grassroots and their appropriate resolution by way of volunteerism,” he said, congratulating the varsity’s NSS team for taking up some pressing social issues for discussion during the technical sessions, including drug abuse, disaster management, environment protection and others.
Mr Pole also suggested to the NSS team to provide its list of volunteers to district administrations for hassle-free coordination in times of need.
In his special address, Prof Talat underlined the varsity’s commitment to widen its societal outreach to help address important problems like drug abuse and mental health.
He urged the NSS programme officers from colleges to train their students with social service skills that they learned during the seven-day training programme.
“Eventually your learning during this training programme will have to be passed on to your students to widen the ambit of the social service that NSS aims to achieve,” he said.
Registrar Dr Nisar A Mir appreciated the role of NSS team in organising capacity-building and awareness programmes and living up to its core mandate of creating a society that’s conscious of importance of social service.
Programme Coordinator NSS Dr Mussavir Ahmad said 18 technical sessions and two field trips were organised for the participants from Kashmir and Jammu divisions.
He said 38 progamme officers from different colleges participated in the training programme.
Several participants, including Dr Ripi Bhawna from GDC Udhampur and Dr Shamim Ahmad from Gandhi Memorial College Srinagar spoke on the occasion and appreciated the choice of experts selected for the technical sessions, as well as the hospitality provided to them by the University of Kashmir.
Dr Hinna Basharat conducted proceedings of the valedictory session, while Dr Wakar Amin presented a vote of thanks.