Jodhpur : The last lap

Part VII: Jodhpur: The last lap

The last lap at Jodhpur commenced with a false start. I was holding charge of the office of Director of Technical Education of the state of Rajasthan on an adhoc basis  during October-November 1974, in  the leave vacancy of the  then Director, who was on encashment leave and was due to retire on December 31, 1974.  I had started thinking about my last lap to commence from  January 1, 1975.  However, it turned out to be a  false start and I kept waiting on the tracks, till the final shot was fired by the state government on July 5, 1975 for my   assumption of charge, as Director of Technical Education.  The emergency had been proclaimed. All was quiet almost everywhere. It looked like silence of the grave. Incidentally, some of the greatest things,  creative thoughts and innovations have found  fertile ground  during such phases of life.

                      Those were    times of unending spells of unemployment, that, made the people frustrated and restive. The economy of the state was stagnant and the financial resources of the state were extremely limited.  The development of industries was stunted and the little bit that they had, was under foreign collaboration with capital intensive machines. The committed liabilities of the state were mounting. Expansion plans of most of the engineering departments of the state were plagued with uncertainty,  due to economy cuts and meagre financial allocations. Unlike in earlier plans, the central government was also in a  tight financial situation. There was a crying need for reorganization of the existing courses in engineering colleges, polytechnics and industrial training institutes and introduction of new need based diversified courses. The whole environment was extremely challenging and helped us in unleashing a flurry of activities in close collaboration with Rajasthan State Road Transport Corporation, Rajasthan State Dairy Development Corporation, Tribal Area Development Commissioner, state government departments and enterprises to open up avenues of employment for engineering graduates, engineering diploma holders and craftsmen, trained in industrial training institutes of the state. And in the process, we  developed and operated training and retraining programmes at all levels to ensure that every student passing out from technical institutions of the state was equipped with    necessary  knowledge and job skills, for meeting the growing needs of state government departments  and industrial and commercial establishments.

Following chapters discuss these in detail:

  1. Commencement of the last lap                                            
  2. Problems facing technical education                                           
  3. Proclamation of emergency in the country                               
  4. Twenty point programme of Indira Gandhi          
  5. Polytechnics and Industrial Training Institutes                    
  6. Service Conditions of Staff                                                                
  7. Khaitan Polytechnic                
  8. Tribal Area Development Plan                             
  9. Rajasthan State Road Transport Corporation                   
  10. Dairy Development in Rajasthan              
  11. Apprenticeship and skill development programmes             
  12. Colombo Plan Staff College                  
  13. Emergency and the aftermath            
  14. Morarji Desai                                                                                            
  15. Freedom from fear          
  16. Janata rule in Rajasthan       
  17. The last lap