43rd Foundation Day of ICAR-NBPGR Celebrated 2019

ICAR-National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources (NBPGR) celebrated its 43rd Foundation Day on August 1, 2019, which was attended by the current and several retired/former staff of the institute. Dr Ramesh V. Sonti, Director, National Institute of Plant Genome Research, Delhi, was the Chief Guest. Dr Kuldeep Singh, Director, ICAR-NBPGR, presented an overview of achievements of the institute in the last one year. On this occasion, the ‘6th Dr Harbhajan Singh Memorial Lecture’ on "Biodiversity databases: Species and their Habitats - Remote Sensing and GIS Perspective" was delivered by Dr Partha Sarathi Roy, Senior Advisor, RS & GIS Research Programme, Innovation Systems for the Drylands, ICRISAT, Hyderabad. A very unique event this year was the presentation of several items belonging to Late Dr Harbhajan Singh, by his family for display in the NBPGR Museum. The items included the original Padma Shree certificate and medal received by him in 1971, Honorary doctorate degree, his leather briefcase, bicycle, trunk, camera and several documents taken on plant explorations. During the function, a E-Herbarium Portal, comprising digitized images of specimens of National Herbarium of Cultivated Plants, was released by the Chief Guest and Speaker. Three publications of NBPGR were also released comprising a teaching manual (Teaching Manual on Plant Taxonomy), an edited book (Transboundary Movement of Living Modified Organisms: Strengthening Capacities of Enforcement Agencies) and a technical bulletin [Strengthening Capacities of Enforcement Agencies (Plant Quarantine and Customs Officials) for Transboundary Movement of Living Modified Organisms]. A cultural programme was also organized by the students, staff and their children.

(Source:  Dr Anuradha Agrawal, ICAR-NBPGR, New Delhi)