The prime goal of the NSS Unit of St.Mary’s Group of Instituttions Gunturis the personality development of students through community services
The concept of National Service Scheme is started in the year 1969 to build sense of social responsibility through teacher and students involvement in constructive service with the motto of “Not Me But You”. NSS volunteers work in rural areas, adopted villages and school to the serving the cause of society through survey, education and health awareness programme.
The overall aim of National Service Scheme as envisaged earlier, is to give an extension dimension to the higher education system and orient the student youth to community service while they are studying in educational institutions. The reason for the formulation of this objective is the general realization that the students in the +2 level and above have a tendency to get alienated from the village/slum masses that constitute the majority of the population of the country. The educated youth who are expected to take the reins of administration in future are found to be unaware of the problems of the community and in certain cases are indifferent towards their needs and problems. Therefore it is necessary to arouse the social conscience of the students, and to provide them an opportunity to work with the people in the villages and slums. It is felt that their interaction with the common villagers and slum-dwellers will expose them to the realities of life, and bring about a change in their social perception.
Development of National Service Scheme:
The concept of making national service a part of university education took about 20 years to evolve from the state of an idea into that of a scheme. The early seeds of it were sown by Dr.S.Radhakrishnan in his Report (1948).The Central Advisory Board of Education discussed the idea and made some recommendations in 1950. In the first Five Year Plan document (1951) the need for social service camps found a mention.During the next few years some institutions already started organizing such camps. Then in 1958, Pandit Nehru, Prime Minister, wrote to Chief Ministers suggesting social service as prerequisite for graduation. In 1959 an outline proposal came up for discussion in the meeting of education ministers from all over India.The concept was accepted, and Deshmukh Committee was formed to propose concrete suggestions(1959). In 1960 further suggestions came from Prof. KG. Saiyidain and these are responsible, more or less, for the scheme as we have it now. But implementation was further delayed. Then came Dr. Kothari's strong recommendations in the year 1966.During the next year Vice Chancellors' Meeting took place and in 1969 a conference of student leaders welcomed the scheme. By that time the Fourth Five Year Plan was ready to be launched. It carried an outlay of five Crores rupees for NSS.On September 24,1969, the then Union Education Minister Dr.V.K.R.V. Rao, launched the NSS programme in 37 universities covering all States and simultaneously requested the Chief Ministers of States for their cooperation and help.