Jul 11, 2007, 14:46 GMT
Jammu, July 11 (IANS) Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will be visiting Jammu on July 15 to receive an honorary degree of Doctor of Letters (Honoris Causa) from the University of Jammu, officials said Wednesday.
'This is the first time that Dr. Manmohan Singh would be receiving an honorary degree from any Indian university,' said Amitabh Mattoo, the vice chancellor of the University of Jammu.
He added that the degree that would be conferred upon the prime minister would be embossed in golden letters and wrapped in a specially designed papier mache frame.
Singh was scheduled to visit Jammu July 10 but the visit was postponed because of the death of former prime minister Chandra Shekhar.
Apart from attending the special convocation of the University of Jammu, where the honorary degree would be conferred on him, the prime minister is also scheduled to lay the foundation stone of a satellite township with two-room tenements for Kashmiri Pandit migrants at Jagti, a Jammu suburb.
Singh had promised them better living facilities during his first visit to Jammu after becoming the prime minister in November 2004.
More than 350,000 Kashmiri Hindus, better known as Kashmiri Pandits, had fled the Kashmir Valley, fearing persecution at the hands of Islamic militants. They were first housed in refugee colonies in Jammu and its surroundings and later shifted to one-room tenements, with narrow lanes and lack of civic amenities.
© 2007 Indo-Asian News Service
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