16 projects selected for national event

State-level Children’s Science Congress

Our Correspondent

Kapurthala, November 30

“Creativity and innovation are the two key drivers for socio-economic development of a country. The Central Government is laying emphasis on promoting innovation in a big way,” said Dr BS Ghuman, Vice- Chancellor, Punjabi University, Patiala, on the occasion of the 27th state-level Children Science Congress, organised at Science City, here. The event was organised in collaboration with the Punjab State Council for Science and Technology, Chandigarh.

He said such programmes encourage competitiveness and entrepreneurship among young students and motivate them to take up careers in science and technology.

The theme of this year’s science congress was ‘Science technology and innovation for a clean green and healthy nation’. Over 300 students and 150 teachers from all districts of the state participated in the event to exhibit their creativity and innovativeness and their ability to solve societal problems experienced locally using science.

Dr Neelima Jerath, Director General, Science City, said the National Children’s Science Congress was a nationwide science communication programme of the National Council for Science and Technology Communication (NCSTC), Department of Science and Technology, New Delhi, which started in 1993.

Emphasising on ‘Learning by Doing’ and on activities which relate class room knowledge to real-life situations, she said it provides an opportunity to lakhs of children across the country to enjoy learning of science and satisfy their creative urge and curiosity.

Meanwhile, children in the age group of 10-17 years participated in the event and presented an action- oriented research project under the guidance of their teachers.

Besides, eight winning projects at the congress from the junior group (10-13 years) and eight winners from the senior group have been selected for the national-level congress.

“The number of projects selected at the state-level is as per the state-wise quota allocated by the Department of Science and Technology, GoI, which is 16 from the state. These projects and their student heads would participate in the national-level Children Science Congress at Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala from December 27 to 31,” said Dr Jerath.