Don’t be Afraid of AI: Stalin Tells Fine Arts Students
The Chief Minister congratulated the two well-known artists whom he bestowed with doctorate honoris causa degrees on the occasion for their contributions to art
Chennai: Averring that no amount of technological growth could beat the human mind, Chief Minister M K Stalin told fine arts students not to be afraid of Artificial Intelligence (AI) robbing their opportunities just because it was being used elaborately nowadays to create paintings, songs and music.
Speaking at the third convocation ceremony of the Tamil Nadu Dr J Jayalalithaa Music and Fine Arts University at the Anna Centenary Library on Friday, Stalin said technology should be harnessed to strengthen humans because any weapon could be best used only by those who possessed the skills to use it.
However, he urged the students to master technologies like AI and cited film actor and Member of Parliament Kamal Hassan as an example for a curious mind, pursuing knowledge. He said the actor had gone to the US recently to learn AI, something that everyone could do by browsing the internet that would help them join training programmes.
Urging the students to express their knowledge and skills through arts, he said only the arts could safeguard the culture, language and race and even bring about a panacea for problems like mobile phone and drug addictions that were prompting the youth to neglect their health.
Wishing the students all the best in their artistic endeavors, he said that they should bring laurels to the State through their excellence in arts by winning awards ranging from Kalaimamani, given by the State government, to national and international honours.
Though it was a graduation day ceremony, he wanted to make four announcements of the government relating to the promotion of arts. One was on allocating land for the setting up a folk and rural arts school at Vellaiyankulam in Thiruparankundram taluk of Madurai district.
The other three, relating to the university, were the starting of a postgraduate course in fine arts from 2026-27 to help students sharpen their skills and earn more income, increasing the subsidy to the university to Rs 5 crore from the present Rs 3 crore to improve their teaching and administrative skills and introducing Spoken English classes and digital literacy training in the university.
The Chief Minister congratulated the two well-known artists whom he bestowed with doctorate honoris causa degrees on the occasion for their contributions to art. Tamil film star Sivakumar who is also an artist, was one of them and the other was artist Chandru, who had created most of the sculptures installed at the roadside parks around rountanas in Chennai.
Stressing on the importance of promoting arts that distinguished human beings from animals, Stalin said that the arts like music, painting, sculpture, writing and drama were under the purview of humans, who alone could create and appreciate them while animals could not do anything beyond walking, running, eating, sleeping and fighting.
