He has taken education to needy

By Ashwani Dutta

HE has taken education to the needy people. He is a crusader who has dedicated his life to the D.A.V. movement. The person is none other than the 89-year-old Jagan Nath Kapur, who has been behind the running of 17 educational institutions, including two dental colleges, in various parts of northern India.

Due to his old age, J.N. Kapur is unable to move much but he still works round the clock from his house, which he has converted into a camp office. Despite his humble and simple living, he has made a big empire of D.A.V. institutions. Jagan Nath Kapur has had the privilege to be associated with freedom fighters like Lala Lajpat Rai, Sardar Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Gopi Chand Bhargava and Professor Veda Vyas, a leading advocate of the Supreme Court and life member of the D.A.V. College Managing Committee.

Jagan Nath Kapur was born on August 16, 1911 to Dr Uttam Chand, a medical practitioner who belonged to Chaniot in Pakistan. Kapur lost his father when he was three and a half years. He got free education, and in those formative years he pledged to repay his debt to society. He passed LL.B from Law College, Lahore.

Jagan Nath Kapur went to Delhi and then to Calcutta before coming to Yamunanagar. He rendered yeoman service in the rehabilitation of refugees from West Pakistan at Kurukshetra in 1947-48. In 1953, he started the first D.A.V. institution — D.A.V. High School which has now been converted into D.A.V. Senior Secondary School. This school has a strength of 1100 students today.

In 1959, J.N.Kapur started D.A.V. college for girls with only four students, out of which two received free education. The college now provides education in all disciplines up to the graduate level and offers postgraduate classes in selected subjects. Jagan Nath Kapur was once the youngest member of the D.A.V. College Managing Committee, and today he is the oldest member. He has pioneered new areas and, consequently, added new dimensions to the D.A.V. movement by taking up health and education for the aged and the helpless. The concrete shape to his pursuit was given with the opening of Dayanand Hospital on January 13, 1986 by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. The 100-bedded hospital with an OPD section has the latest appliances, a well equipped operation theatre, and a dental wing.

Jagan Nath’s lofty and abiding passion for health education inspired him to found D.A.V. Dental College. The college is now affiliated to Kurukshetra University and is approved by the Dental Council of India. It admits 40 students every year. It is the first institute of its kind in North India which is being run by a private body.

He even motivates residents of Yamunanagar to donate money liberally. He keeps coming up with new ways of collecting funds. He hit upon a novel idea of building a number of shops along the boundary of D.A.V. Senior Secondary School and rented them out. The rent provides regular support to the institution.

Jagan Nath is also one of the founders of the Haryana Chamber of Commerce and Industry. He served the organisation as general secretary for a number of years. He has the magnetic power of drawing people for a cause. Radiating affection, he makes an impression on all those who come in contact with him.

With the efforts of this crusader about 6500 students are being provided education in different D.A.V. educational institutions in Yamunanagar district. J.N. Kapur claims that his happiest moment was when he started D.A.V. Senior Secondary School in 1953. His 17th institution — D.A.V. Dental College at Solan came up about two years ago. He said M.R. Aggarwal of Solan, a philanthropist, donated five acres of land.