Sagayathottam Institute of Agriculture and Rural Development (SIARD) (Sagayathottam, Vellore)

About the College:

One of the Oldest Diploma Institutes in Tamil Nadu. The idea of starting an agricultural school was conceived in 1954. It became a reality only in 1959, when the farm was equipped with sufficient infrastructures. On Feb 26,1976 the Agricultural training given in the school was recognized by the Government, as an Agricultural demonstration Maestry Course. Efforts continued to make this course into a diploma course. Recognizing our meritorious service in the field of agriculture, department of Tamil Nadu has issued the necessary orders to conduct this two-year diploma course. The Tamil Nadu agricultural university, Coimbatore was pleased to grand recognition and affiliation to Sagayathottam Institute of Agriculture to conduct two-year diploma course from the year 1987-88.

Don Bosco College of Agriculture

The present College, affiliated to the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU), which is rated the best Agricultural University in the country by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), will offer undergraduate courses (B.Sc.) in Agriculture and related fields. It is also intended to be a centre of research and development in agriculture. The college received its first batch of sixty students on 8thSeptember 2014.

Delivering his inaugural address, Fr. Jayapalan described the college as a historic milestone in the annals of the Salesian Province of Chennai, which has always had as one of its main thrusts the empowering of rural youth, particularly the poor ones, through technical education. Today, while India ranks second in the world for farm output, and our agriculture and allied fields account for 50 per cent of the total workforce in the country, the sad fact is that a large percentage of our agricultural workers are unskilled in modern techniques resulting in low productivity. Agricultural training institutes are far below the requirement. This is where, we hope, the Don Bosco College of Agriculture will make a big difference, he said.

The college motto “Labor omnia vincit”, a Latin phrase meaning “hard work overcomes everything”, is from a poem by the Roman poet Virgil (29 BC), who composed it to support and promote Augustus Caesar’s “Back to the Land” campaign designed to encourage Romans to take up agriculture.

The College is a humble tribute to Don Bosco to commemorate the bicentenary of his birth, 1815-2015.