Vice Chancellor University of Kashmir (KU) Prof Talat Ahmad on Monday inaugurated a week-long e-faculty development programme on Cloud Computing.
The programme is meant for the faculty members belonging to Computer Sciences, Engineering and Information Technology. In view of ongoing lockdown due to coronavirus pandemic, the programme will be conducted online on zoom platform.
Speaking at the inaugural function the VC highlighted the importance of conducting such courses online at a time when the faculty members were not in a position to visit Human Resource Development Centres and attend the courses physically.
Underscoring the significance of the theme of Cloud Computing chosen for the programme, Prof Ahmad informed the participants that in contemporary times when machine learning, data-mining and Cloud Computing were radically changing the way we live, it was prudent to get acquainted about these emerging 21st century technologies.
He said in less than two decades Cloud Computing has revolutionized the way in which not only large corporations and institutions utilize the internet, but individual users as well.
“As we become more and more dependent on our mobile and smart devices, the more we utilize the impact of cloud computing to access information with ease and have unlimited space”, he said.
The VC congratulated the UGC-HRDC for organizing the course besides a series of international webinar lectures on varied topics that have immensely benefited the student community as well as faculty at home in times of COVID19 lockdown.
He urged upon the office bearers of the HRDC to widen the scope of online courses enabling more and more participants to attend the events.
Welcoming the VC, resource persons and the participants, Director, UGC-HRDC, Prof Shabir Ahmad Bhat said Cloud Computing was gaining ground in the current technological era and large companies like Amazon and Google have already taken their operations to cloud.
“It has changed the entire landscape of business and it is important that we put our minds around the concept to really understand what it is and why it is the next big thing,” he said.
He said more business organisations have moved to cloud and have been able to achieve their goals, remain competitive, and increase their productivity by going in this direction.
He said it was making business management very easy. Course Coordinator, Dr Rana Hashmy who was working as senior scientist in the Department of Computer Sciences, KU elaborated upon the curriculum and schedule of the proposed programme and said that a battery of accomplished and acclaimed resource persons have been invited to deliver lectures during the course.
Coordinator, UGC-HRDC, Dr Muhammad Ishaq Geer in his address said in the recent past the Centre has conducted three international webinars that were attended by thousands of participants from all across the world and two more were lined up in near future.
“Thus we are trying to make the best use of this lockdown period and providing an academic feast to the students and scholars,” he said. He said the Cloud Computing has provided the best solution to address multiple business needs besides having the added advantages of scalability, cost savings, agility, strategic edge, high speed, reliability, mobility, unlimited storage capacity and business continuity as well as the ability to manage huge