MANGALURU: Billionaire Shashi Kiran Shetty, who was in the news for buying Bollywood superstar Rajesh Khanna’s Carter Road bungalow in Mumbai for Rs 90 crore, will be presented an honorary degree at Mangalore University’s 33rd annual convocation.
Prof Govardhan Mehta will deliver the convocation address at the event to be held in Mangala auditorium on Wednesday. Mehta and B V R Chowdari are the others who will receive honorary degrees. Out of the 23,385 students who passed the exams, 1,385 (PhD 88; PG 304; UG 923) will receive degrees personally from University Chancellor Vajubhai Rudabhai Vala.
Prof Mehta, former chairman of Board of Governors, NITK, is a scientist of international repute.
A recipient of the Padmashri Award and the ‘Chevalier de la legion d’Honneur’ awarded by the President of France, he is presently a National Research professor and Jubilant-Bhartia Chair professor at the University of Hyderabad.
Prof Chowdari is the Executive Director of Indian Research Initiatives that had arranged scholarships and internships for Indian researchers at the National University of Singapore.
An Inspiration
Shashi Kiran Shetty (56), hailing from Bantwal, is Executive Chairman of Allcargo Logistics Ltd — a part of the Avvashya Group which is India’s first integrated multinational player in the logistics sector. After obtaining a degree in commerce from SVS College in Bantwal, he began his career in the logistics industry in the 1980s with a single forklift and later formed Allcargo Logistics in 1993. The venture has now grown to register a top-line income of over US $750 mn (2012) spread across 90 countries connecting 4,000 port points. His venture employs about 8,500 people in over 200 offices spread across the world. Shetty launched Avashya Foundation for funding social welfare schemes, disaster relief programmes, health care, education, sports, women empowerment and environment sustainability activities. Besides the entrepreneur of the year award in services category (Ernst and Young, 2010), his philanthropy initiatives have won him many awards like MALA corporate social responsibility award (2013).