A two-day international conference on “Social Justice: A Mirage or Reality in Plural societies” held at department of politics and governance, Central University of Kashmir ended on Friday, a CUK spokesman said in a statement.
He said theconference was financially supported by the J& K Bank. The inauguralsession of the conference on 13 June was attended by the Registrar of CUK ProfFayaz Ahmad Nika, Prof Abdul Gani, Director, Research and Development, CUK,Prof. Valerian Rodrigues from JNU, Prof. Naseer-ud-din from Jamia HamdardUniversity, Dr Khalid Wasim, CoordinatorDPG and other faculty members from within and outside the CUK along with theresearchers and students of DPG.
The conference Convener Dr Himabindu, Assistant Professor,department of Politics & Governance, in her welcome address introduced thetheme of the conference. She stated that in the modern world there is anongoing debate on collective responsibility and individual liberty along withdiscussions on philosophical inquisitions of social justice in pluralsocieties. The keynote address was delivered by Prof. Valerian Rodrigues, JNUand visiting Professor at Simon Fraser University, Canada. He presented theslope of the debate on social justice since the last fifty years. He traced theemergence of the debate globally and its eventual ascension into India.Besides, he highlighted the Rawlsian position on justice and the liberal,libertarian and environmental critiques attached to it followed by Rawlsianargument against the criticism that the outcome of freedom is pluralism.
Prof Fayaz Ah. Nika while addressing in the conferencestated that his view on the theme is that it is a very relevant concept whichwas prevalent even in British India when Hunter Commission was employed tocheck inclusivity.
Speaking on the occasion, Prof. Abdul Gani who brought forththe concepts of liberty and equity and their relevance in the concept of socialjustice.
The valedictory session of this International Conference washeld on 14th June and it started with a Round table discussion under the theme”Social justice and Electoral Processes”.
The Vice Chancellor of CUK, Prof. Meraj-UD- Din Mir was alsopresent on the oc-casaion and he talked about the importance of Social Justicein the society as well as need of ethics in politics. The vote of thanks wasproposed by Dr. Himabindu M., Conference Convener and Assistant professor, DPG,CUK.