Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday interacted with the Directors of centrally-funded technical institutions emphasising that higher educational institutions need to prepare the youth for continuous disruptions and changes, keeping in mind the fourth industrial revolution.

There is a need to adapt higher education and technical education to the changing environment and emerging challenges. He added that this requires the institutions to reinvent and re-evaluate themselves, develop alternative and innovative models in accordance with the present and future needs of the country and society, said PM Modi during video conferencing. Lauding the Research and Development work done by these institutions towards meeting the challenges posed by Covid, Modi said ‘Aatmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan’ will form the basis of dreams and aspirations of India in the coming 25 years when the country will celebrate 100 years of independence. Adding that technological, R&D institutions will play a major role in the upcoming decade, which is also being called as “India’s Techade”.

‘Futuristic solutions’

“We need to focus on developing futuristic solutions in education, healthcare, agriculture, defence, and cyber technologies. It is important there is good quality infrastructure in higher educational institutions to ensure that products associated with Artificial Intelligence, smart wearables, augmented reality systems, and digital assistants reach the common man,” said the Prime Minister.

Higher education

During the interaction, Govindan Rangarajan of IISc Bangalore, Subhasis Chaudhuri of IIT Bombay, Bhaskar Ramamurthi of IIT Madras, and Abhay Karandikar of IIT Kanpur, highlighted various ongoing projects, academic work, and research.

Appreciating the improvement in the Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in higher education in the past few years, Modi emphasised that digitisation of higher education can play a big role in increasing GER, and students will have easier access to good quality and affordable education.

Meanwhile, newly appointed Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan after taking charge of the Ministry said, “I am confident that under the guidance of the Prime Minister and the support of our academic institutions, we will continue to set new benchmarks in integrating education with employment and making it more inclusive, holistic, multi-disciplinary and at par with global standards”.

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW