After Jackfruit Mission, Mushroom Mission, Milk Mission and Aroma Mission, Meghalaya Government launched another mission, the ‘Meghalaya Muga Mission’ to promote and give value addition to ‘muga’ silk in the state.
The Meghalaya ‘Muga mission’ was launched by Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma on 28 May 2019 with an aim to boost ‘muga’ production over the next five years. The muga silkworm rearing is found only in the Northeastern region of the country, mainly in the Brahmaputra Valley and in the foothills of Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland. In Meghalaya, muga is traditionally cultivated in West Khasi hills, East Garo hills, North Garo Hills, West Garo Hills and Ri-Bhoi districts. The mission entails a financial implication of more than Rs 138 crore from 2019 to 2024.
Hybrid High-Impact Pedagogy to Enhance Learning Experience among Students – Dr. Nripendra Singh
Dr. Nripendra Singh is the Professor of Marketing in the College of Business Administration at Clarion University of Pennsylvania, USA. He is involved in a discussion with professors at Shillong University to improve teaching and learning for students in their department. Some excerpts from the discussion are presented in this article.
This article is not meant to downplay the brilliant performance of our academically bright students. Nor it is meant to explain away the below-average performance of others. Nonetheless, even as we let the dust settle after the announcement of the results of our national board exams, we do well to ponder the educational system once again.
“We have a huge vested interest in education. Partly because it is education that’s meant to take us into this future that we can’t grasp” says Sir Ken Robinson. This is a remarkable diagnosis of our defective posture on education. Is extolling education as our sole guiding light into the future justifiable? Given, the utter unpredictability of our future and the historic inadequacy of education to solve our simple socio-economic irregularities, let alone solving life’s deepest problems, hailing education as the sole saviour seem superfluous. How silly to tell our children that it is education that will help you to trump all in the future when we know that the country is largely paralyzed by the mess created by so-called educated ones! Look at our administrative machinery, for example.
Farmers regard japi as the portable home of the farming field. Along with earthworm, it is all weather friends for the farmer, especially in their bread earning drudgery. While in action, it shelters farmers from rain or sunshine during summer. Sadly, days are seemingly numbered for the dream refuse of cultivators because of the growing sacristy of japi pat.
If our apprehension comes true, the farming fraternity will be in trouble,” Prabin Das, an accomplished artisan in Japi making craft said. Japi, the integral part of Assamese culture and prized possession of farmers are made of particular leaves of a hilly grown plant known as lechara gas Licualapeltata. The leaves of this plant are indispensable in making this headgear if the latter is meant for farmers. Skeleton of the headgear is made of bamboo.
ICAR organizes Orientation & Validation of diagnostic Kits
Demonstration of 17 animal disease diagnostic kits assembled and developed under the DBT-ADMAC project was held at Division of Animal Health, ICAR RC NEH Region, Umiam, Meghalaya from 10th to 11th June 2019.
The kits were developed with combined efforts of regional partners like College of Veterinary Sciences (CVSc), Khanapara, Guwahati (Core lab-I), ICAR RC NEH, Umiam, Meghalaya (Core lab-II) and CVSc, Mizoram (Core lab-III) along with national partners viz., National Institute of High Security Animal Diseases (ICAR-NISHAD), Bhopal; ICAR-NRC on Equine, Hissar, National Institute of Veterinary Epidemiology and Disease Informatics (ICAR-NIVEDI), Bangalore and National Research Centre on Pig, Rani. The project was conceptualized for five years starting August 2014 for development and transferring of animal disease diagnostic kits and technologies to the NER state Animal Disease diagnostic Laboratories. After enormous efforts the project came into implementation this year. All the NE states Veterinary diagnostics wings participated in the program; they were briefed about the utility of these diagnostics kits and were given hands on training. They were also provided with a comprehensive diagnostic package consisting of all these 17 kits for validation at their respective laboratory so that they can be used in future. The kits have been developed indigenously by three NER-Core labs and three national labs. This is expected to tremendously benefit the states in terms of savings earned by saving on valuable foreign exchequer. Dr. N. N. Barman elaborated on the concept and validation of the diagnostic Kits and how disease detection can strengthen animal disease management. Addressing gathering Dr. N. Prakash Directors of ICAR-RC NEH said that with disease diagnostic kits and the launch of Biotech Kisan the famers will benefit immensely and the institute has reached new heights. Dr. N. Kalita, Director of Research, AAU emphasized on the fact that detection of disease outbreak can have a social impact of the society and the benefits of it are immense.Speaking on the occasion Dr C. Shylla Director, Vety. Services said that the right diagnostic at the right time can be a boon for the disease management scenario in the state. The program was attended by Directors of ICAR-NRC-Pig, NERDDL, Guwahati, CVSc, Khanapara, ATARI, Umiam and Shri GaigondingPanmei, Financial Advisor NEC Shillong along with scientists, professors, researchers and academicians from the respective institutes.
