Arunachal: One-Day International Webinar on ‘Conceptualizing Contemporaneity of Gandhi’
Itanagar: The Department of English, Rajiv Gandhi University, Arunachal Pradesh (India), hosted a One-Day International Webinar on the topic ‘Conceptualizing Contemporaneity of Gandhi’ on 25th August in collaboration with Gandhi-King Global Initiative, Stanford University Centre, USA & Gandhi-King Foundation, Hyderabad, India. The Webinar commenced at 8 am and was held online in complete compliance with the government’s order on social distancing in educational institutes. The event recorded overwhelming response from participants from India and abroad.
The keynote Address was delivered by Prof. Paul Bueno de Mesquita , Director, Centre for Non-violence and Peace Studies, The University of Rhode Island, Kingston, who set the tone of the event by affirming the continued relevance of Gandhian principles and philosophy in an increasingly hostile geo-political environment across the globe.
The event spread over two sessions, had eminent intellectuals and Gandhi scholars such as Prof. Clayborne Carson, Director, Martin Luther King Jr. Education and Research Institute, Stanford Institute, Palo Alto, CA, USA, Prof. Isao Takagi, Soka University, Japan, Prof. Naresh Kumar Sharma , University of Hyderabad , Hyderabad, India, Prof. Michael Honey Haley, University of Washington Tacoma, Radcliffe, USA, and David Kirshbaum, Nonviolence International Representative to the United Nations, New York.
The inaugural session of the programme saw successful culmination with encouraging words from Prof. Saket Kushwaha, the Hon’ble Vice-Chancellor of Rajiv Gandhi University, Arunachal Pradesh. Prof. Kushwaha emphasized on the necessity of recognizing peace as the central principle of life. Prof. Amitava Mitra was the chief guest of the Evening Session (06-08 p.m. IST).
In the Evening Session Prof. Michael Honey Haley and David Kirshbaum shared their scholarship on Mahatma Gandhi. Shri Prasad Gollannapalli was the moderator of both the sessions of the webinar. His experience and expertise on Gandhian studies and philosophy guided the event to a resounding success. Dr. K C Mishra, HoD, Department of English coordinated the event along with Dr. C K Panda as Convener and Dr. P N Piraji as Co-convener and the faculty members of the Department of English.
