New Delhi, Oct 10 : Union Human Resource Development Minister Arjun Singh will inaugurate the Conference of the Vice Chancellors here today.

UGC is organising a two-day conference of Vice Chancellors of all central, state, deemed and private universities.

Over 400 vice chancellors from all universities from across the country are scheduled to attend the conference.

Valedictory address of the conference will be delivered by Union Minister for Science and Technology Kapil Sibal,

To commemorate the completion of 150 glorious years of Modern University System, an exhibition is also being organized by the UGC, depicting through the exhibits, the journey of Higher Education from early 18th century onwards.

This exhibition which will act as a prism to view the vision and horizon of Higher Education will be inaugurated by Arjun Singh.

The conference is a culmination of four Regional Conferences that the UGC had organised at Mumbai, Kolkata, Hyderabad and New Delhi in which a total of 218 vice chancellors, directors of the college development councils and secretaries/directors of higher education of different states, chairpersons of state councils of higher education had participated.

The issues raised and recommendations made in the regional conferences will be deliberated upon in this conference and would revolve around the following six themes.

The themes are expansion of Higher Education, equity and inclusion, quality and excellence, academic and administrative reforms, private participation in Higher Education and internationalisation and financing of Higher Education.

These themes will be deliberated upon in six technical sessions to be chaired by eminent people like Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, Professor Yashpal, former Chairman, UGC; Professor Y.K. Alagh, former Union Minster of Planning and Programme Implementation; Professor B. Mungekar, Member , Planning Commission. (ANI)