Sharodiyo Shiksha @ BESC

Durga Puja is perhaps the biggest social festival of its kind in the world. It is a time, when time itself comes to a standstill, with people across caste, creed or colour going out to celebrate. At the Bhawanipur Education Society College (BESC) however, the celebrations took a different turn, as members of the faculty and willing students celebrated the victory of enlightenment over the evil forces of ignorance. Their move was certainly against the grains, and definitely one that was an exception of sorts as select facilities in the college remained open even when educational institutions in general went on a siesta.

BESC students collaborated with the Kolkata Police to select and crown the best puja’s and with the hectic pandal-hopping out of their system, headed straight back to the college. For, in store for them were a variety of Career Connect courses that the college had lined up – courses that celebrated the advent of the Goddess Durga, in letter and the spirit of the Puja’s.
A 15-day tally course was a case in point. Conducted by Pankaj Gupta, the short burst had students keying in their desire for mastery and going out with the printed copies of their excellence, balanced and reflecting the true and fair view of their achievement.

A course on GST, which too was of a 15-day duration, was equally successful. Students thronged the class rooms to hear actual practitioners of the calling explain the nitty-gritties of the newly introduced tax regime, toiling upward even as the revelries around then reached a feverish pitch.

En Vogue – a course aimed at personal grooming, was another offering from the college that was very well received by the students. The classes, students felt, helped them to add just that much more finesse in their acts.

For ten days, Chandrayee Bagchi took the students into the fascinating world of digital marketing, where the emerging trends and the means of riding them into the future were discussed threadbare, empowering all those who were willing to take the next big step into the net.

Vishal Dave held a five-day cracker of a course on Ethical Hacking, teaching the students the ways and means of guarding themselves from the very real threats that the digital world poses. In a way, it was Durga Puja all over as the students enacted the triumph the Goddess over the dark side, in the net.

An intensive, one-day seminar cum workshop on trading strategies was also organised where Chetan Panchamia explained to the students how they can strategize to beat the market and profit from its swings. Students – budding stock legends all, participated, and were exposed to the dynamics of the markets and the opportunities they offer.

All the courses were priced in an extremely attractive manner, subsidised as they were by the college. In all, about 150 students participated in the various courses, invoking the Blessing of a different kind from the Goddess. Explaining the rationale behind the entire exercise Prof Dilip Shah, the Dean of Student affairs of BESC said, “we are extremely happy to have started this exercise, and the whole-hearted participation of the students has been really encouraging. The big idea is to constantly strive to move away from the culture of long holidays and work towards an environment where we can use the recesses to reskill ourselves. I personally feel that it is the duty of the institutions to offer the willing students the opportunity to enhance skill sets and at BESC we are proud to have taken this step in that direction. I am sure that the ripples that we create today will one day move to touch the others, gathering momentum as it moves forward.”