Nepali Congress 15th General Convention General Secretary candidate Nain Singh Mahar said that the compulsion for students to hold a certificate on one hand and a passport on the other should end in this generation as they graduate from university.

Addressing the historic first general convention of the Nepal Teachers Association, leader Mahar said that locking educational institutions will not open the doors to prosperity. “We must have the courage to hand over not just a ‘degree’ but also the ‘fatherhood’ of the country to students,” Referring to the convocation ceremony of Tribhuvan University, he said, “When graduating from university, there should be assurance of employment along with the certificate.”

Noting that it is sad that no university in Nepal is among the world’s top 500, Mahar pointed out the need for universities with a ‘big vision’ rather than ‘big buildings’. He claimed that Nepal has ample grounds to make it an ‘international hub of education’ as it has Mount Everest, Lumbini, and a rare culture.

“The style of trading coal with diamonds should be changed,” he said. “We should create an environment where students around the world search ‘Where to study?’ and ‘Nepal’ comes up in the results.” Leader Mahar said that practical education that is ‘important at home and sold abroad’ is the need of the day, and he believed that Nepalis should work hard to become degree experts.

He said that the Nepali Congress is not engaged in formulating education policies for the next election, but for the future of the next generation. He emphasized that Nepal needs to strengthen internal capacity rather than look to foreigners to graduate from LDC in 2026 and meet the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals.