HARVEST OF RICHES
PUNJAB AGRICULTURAL UNIVERSITY | ESTABLISHED IN 1962
SOWING THE SEED
While studying at the University of Michigan, US, Pratap Singh Kairon, chief minister of Punjab for eight-and-a-half-years, witnessed ‘land grant colleges’ wherein local farming communities contributed land for agricultural and other educational institutes. Set up on an extensive, 1,510 acre campus on the Ludhiana-Ferozepur highway, PAU replicated that model when Jawaharlal Nehru formally inaugurated it on July 8, 1963. Initially headed by P.N. Thapar, a senior Indian Civil Service officer, PAU has since had some of India’s best known agricultural scientists at its helm. Mohinder Singh Randhawa, a civil servant as well as a renowned botanist, was responsible for setting the university’s hugely successful course.
CROP OF FUTURE PLANS
Agricultural needs, says PAU’s vice-chancellor Baldev Singh Dhillon, have changed dramatically over the years. “The challenge now is to strike the right balance between economic success and environmental conservation. Agriculture can no longer be about brute production.”