CHHATTISGARH: Surajpur Collector Gaurav Kumar Singh has something special to offer to the youth. In an attempt to unlock their potential, the officer has launched ‘Bhavishya Drishti Yuva Shrishti’ (a vision for building the youth’s future). Surajpur, located on the banks of the Rihand River, is the district headquarters, around 300km from state capital Raipur.
The programme aims at guiding youth through eight dialogue (samvad) sessions focused on students. The initiative commenced last year in north Chhattisgarh’s Surajpur and has helped over 2,500 students from higher secondary school onwards to evaluate their career prospects and making informed choices based on their individual capacity and priority.
Singh, a 2013-batch IAS officer, introduced a meaningful ‘dialogue’ (samvad) not just to groom the youth to foster all-round growth in a transition phase of their careers but also to prompt the teachers’ response to formulate academic action plans.
“We try to assist students to frame their own suitable guidelines and precepts to attain their goals. Mentoring them at the right age is important. We need to unleash their potential and help them to count on their strength. The focus is also on their personality development,” said the collector.
The officer has roped in senior administrative officials of Surajpur and a select group of teachers to engage in multifaceted and interactive Samvad sessions with students. “The inspirational talks are aimed toward developing the vision of students, to scale up thinking process and go beyond intellectual capacities in the changing scenario,” said Rahul Deo, CEO, district panchayat, Surajpur.
The session begins with a ‘Yuva Samvad’ between the students and collector Gaurav Singh and his team of senior officers. This is followed by weekly ‘Prerna (motivation) Samvad’ in schools or colleges where the collector, district police chief, CEO, and administrative officials interact with students and teachers.
There’s an exclusive sitting with selected teachers to identify innovations applicable in the field of education and enhance academic performance. The teachers then spell out ways to fuel one’s ambitions under ‘Bhavishya Samvad’ by discussing topics such as Vishay (subject) Samvad, Career Samvad, Vyaktitva (personality) Samvad and Aabhasi (virtual) Samvad.
“The interactive sessions are youth-friendly with healthy exchange of ideas,” said Sunita Rajwade, Class 12 students in Ramanujnagar. “Several students have for the first time had fruitful discussions with the Collector. We learned about digital revolution that carries considerable scope for jobs,” said Tabassum Parveen, a Class 11 student.
In the district having 94 higher secondary schools and 11 colleges, the youths are provided information on various welfare schemes and ways to access them.