The honourable Vice-Chancellor of Dibrugarh University Dr. Devdas Kakati formally declared the workshop open at the inaugural function held on 27 March at 10 am in the Aniruddha Dev Bhavan. In his speech Dr. Kakati enumerated a number of aspects demanding quick actions to mould the society in a desired manner. The coordinator of the event Prof. Paramananda Mahanta welcomed the guests and delegates, while Shri Arup K. Misra, Fellow of Vigyan Prasar, introduced VP and its activities. Dr. Subodh Mahanti of Vigyan Prasar explained the rationale of organizing such workshops and briefed about the desired outcome. Prof. Jyoti Prasad Medhi, Professor Emeritus of Gauhati University, lauded the efforts of VP in his brief address to the gathering. The session was presided over by Dr. J.C. Mahanta, Director of the Indian Council of Medical Research (Northeast chapter). The presence of the faculty, staff and students of the university, and a host of leading citizens from Dibrugarh including Shri Harihar Das, ex-Chairman of Assam Branch of the Indian Tea Association; Shri Binay Dowerah, retd. GM of Indian Oil Corporation; Prof. Sunil Barthakur, a noted educationist; Shri Manoj Jalan of Jalan Industries, Prof. Dhiren Barua from the tea sector lent weight to the function. The technical sessions, three in number, were arranged in such a way that the past and present of popular science writing in Assamese were adequately brought out in a systematic and chronological way. Maximum possible topics were covered during these sessions through brief paper presentations by the experts interspersed with enough discussion and queries. The lively presentations did not restrict to only written form of communication. As expected, they went far ahead to touch other means of communication like folk forms, drama & theatre, village discussions, puppetry, etc. Many burning problems faced by writers & readers, publishers & distributors were raised by the experts. Need for proper survey of readers' tastes, content analysis of the newspapers and magazines, standardizing terminology used, discrimination in writing for various age and sex groups, maintaining correlation between the published literature and needs of the society dominated the proceedings of the workshop. The experts who contributed technical papers in these sessions were : Shri Kalyan Bhuyan, Dr. Jayanti Chutia, Dr. Dimbeswar Chaliha, Dr. Ratan .K. Kataki, Dr. ( Mrs.) Niru Dutta, Dr. L.P. Dutta, Dr. Akhil Kumar Deka, Prof. Shyama Prasad Sharma, Dr.Dinesh Chandra Goswami, Shri Rana Pratap Hazarika, Mrs. Anna Jyoti Gogoi, Shri Abdul Wakid, Dr. Pradeep Gogoi, Dr. Bhubaneswar Sahariah, Shri Arpan Dutta, Mrs. Bandita Phukan, Mrs. Aditi Bezbaruah, Mrs. Swapna Dutta Deka, Shri Deepak Kumar Neog, Mrs. Amiya Rajbongshi, Mrs. Sudakshina Das, Shri Jugananda Bora, Shri Santanu Tamuly and Prof. Bijoy Krishna Deva Sarma.

The post-lunch session of 28 March was entirely devoted to drawing up of recommendations of the workshop and division of roles among the participants vis-…-vis Vigyan Prasar's actions in the near future. The most significant resolutions were:

1. Publication of a proceedings of the workshop in book form (English and Assamese) within six months with the topics given below to cover all important aspects of popular science writing and other communication in Assamese :

(a) Science through drama .. Prof. S.P. Sharma.
(b) Survey of popular science literature .. Shri S. Tamuly.
(c) Science in newspapers ... Prof. P. Mahanta.
(d) Science for women .. Dr. N. Dutta ( health issues) .. Mrs. A. Bezbaruah ( for housewives).
(e) Technical terms for medical science .. Dr. L. P. Dutta.
(f) Assam Science Society : History and Growth .. Dr. B.K. Sarma or Dr. Ashwini Kumar Bora.
(g) Popular science magazines in Assamese .. Dr. K.D. Baruah.
(h) Science writing for children .. Mrs. Bandita Phukan.
(i) Science fiction in Assamese .. Shri Z. Ahmed.
(j) Popular science through electronic media .. Shri Munin Bhuyan.
(k) Science movement in Assam .. Dr. B. Sahariah.
(l) Translation work in Assamese.. Dr. A.C. Goswami.
(m) Science for neo-literates .. Dr. B.K. Dev Sharma.
(n) Growth & Development of Assamese science literature .. Prof. D. Chaliha.

Prof. P. Mahanta of Dibrugarh University would be the Chief Editor of this volume and he would co-opt 3 or 4 members to constitute the editorial board.

2. Formation of an advisory and coordination committee for identifying topics and preparing manuscripts of some popular books in Assamese with Prof. S.P. Sharma as its convenor. He would co-opt 4 more writers to assist him in this task. Each of the books would contain atleast 150 pages including illustrations and photographs. The topics to be taken up in the first lot are :

a. History of S&T in Assam in the last millennium.
b. Superstitions.
c. Kaziranga and the wild life of Assam.
d. Women and health.
e. Few environmental hotspots like Majuli island, coal mining,deforestation, river erosion, floods of Assam.
f. Health & Hygiene for the masses.

3. Starting a feature service in Assamese for which Dr. D.C. Goswami of RRLJorhat would plan and coordinate the work. Initially one or two popular Assamese daily newspapers would be taken up.

4. Adoption of street play and mobile theater groups for science popularization by VP in collaboration with the existing groups, mainly those working with Prof. Shyama Prasad Sharma. The participants as well as the audience highly praised VP for holding this event in Dibrugarh, an ancient town of old Assamese culture and polity, and assured of their cooperation in all its endeavours.

- Anup Kumar Mishra & Paramananda Mahanta