NCC to add extra points in mark sheets

Disciplined

If you plan for a year sow paddy, if you plan for a decade plant trees and if you plan for the future, nurture youth,’ is an old Chinese proverb which holds true for our country's most premier youth force - the National Cadet Corps (NCC). From providing a platform for individual upliftment to inculcating a sense of nationalism, the NCC through the years has played a major role in channelising the energy of the youth. In a bid now to reach out to more and more youth, the NCC is ready to expand its contours by becoming an elective subject in 30 universities all across the country. 

Till now, joining NCC was merely an extra-curricular activity in schools and colleges. However, the Ministry of Human Resource and Development and University Grants Commission are ready to make it a credit subject in different universities. “More students will get familiarised with NCC and create a larger base of cadets. We would impart strategic, military and policy-based education to students which would help them to choose a career in Defence services,” shared NCC Dir Gen Lt Gen P. S. Bhalla. “The HRD ministry has forwarded it to the UGC, which will hold consultations with vice-chancellors to take up the proposal as a pilot project.”

Currently, there are three universities where NCC is counted as an elective subject. It includes Madurai Kamaraj University in Tamil Nadu, Mahatma Gandhi University, Kerala and Sardar Patel University, Gujarat. Interestingly, the NCC that has been planning for its expansion in the coming academic year 2013-14 has also changed its curriculum. “For its implementation as an elective subject in colleges we have improvised the course curriculum also. Certain new training progammes have been added to enhance leadership and to groom personalities of college students,” Director Training A of NCC, Colonel S Nand Kumar.

Citing benefits of NCC being introduced in different colleges all across the country, he says, “The aim of NCC is to develop character, discipline, leadership, secular outlook, spirit of adventure and ideals of selfless service among youth. If introduced in universities as an elective subject, NCC will add to the numbers of trained and motivated youth who will be ready to provide leadership.  Its introduction in college will definitely provide a suitable environment to motivate the youth to take part in the Armed Forces.”

Shockingly, the NCC, a quasi-military youth outfit for school and college kids that has 13 lakh students from 15,500 educational institutes under it, will not be an elective subject in Delhi University! “Initially, 30 universities have been selected and Delhi University is not a part of the pilot project by UGC,” says Kumar, without assigning a reason for the omission.