National meeting of BSMA Committee for Forestry held at Nauni

The first national-level meeting of the Broad Subject Matter Area Committee (BSMA) for Forestry Education for restructuring postgraduate curricula and syllabi was held at the Dr YS Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry (UHF), Nauni. The meeting was organised by the UHF’s College of Forestry. Dr P K Mahajan, Dean, College of Forestry was the Convenor of the Committee. Subject experts of various disciplines of Forestry education hailing from renowned universities and institutes of the country participated in the meeting. These included Indian Council for Forestry Research and Education, Dehradun; Uttarakhand University of Horticulture and Forestry; College of Forestry, Ranichauri; CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar; Kerala Agricultural University, Thrissur; Dr Balasaheb Sawant Krishi Vidyapeeth, Maharashtra; College of Horticulture and Forestry, Jhalawar, Rajasthan along with scientists and experts of Forestry from UHF Nauni. Dr P K Mahajan apprised the members of the important points of all the meetings held so far at ICAR New Delhi and concerned issues required to be deliberated upon with special reference to restructuring course curricula and syllabi of M Sc and PhD Forestry in the country. Various issues regarding syllabi on a common academic regulation, course curriculum and contents with an aim to facilitate inter-university students’ exchange, enable students to carry out research in different universities and make course curriculum and academic regulations uniform across different institutes under the ICAR system at the national level were also taken up. Sub-committees, which shall further discuss and execute the restructuring of curricula and syllabi in their respective institutions with the aim of reaching a consensus at the national level in a uniform manner, were also formed. It was decided to hold the second meeting of the committee in the month of August with a few more meetings and workshops to further discuss and deliberate upon implementing common postgraduate curricula and syllabi. A national core group meeting will also be held at New Delhi while the final framing of the policies shall be done at the ICAR level. The policies thus formulated shall have binding on all the universities following the ICAR system of education and shall be known as the 5th Dean Committee Recommendation on postgraduate curricula and syllabi.