New Delhi: The Vice-President, Shri Jagdeep Dhankhar today stated that, “ India is a land of rich languages. Sanskrit, Bangla, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, several languages. Even in Parliament, simultaneous translation takes place in 22 languages. Our civilizational ethos tell us inclusivity. Should there be a confrontational stance on language in the land of Bharat? What a moment of pride for everyone when languages were put in the classical languages status recently. We have to nurture every language. Our languages have global outreach. They are gold mine of literature and the literary pieces have knowledge and wisdom. Vedas, Puranas, our epics Ramayana, Mahabharat, Gita”.
Interacting with the students of IIT Hyderabad, Shri Dhankhar underlined the significance of alumni associations and said that, “ Look at global universities, their endowment funds, billions of US dollars. I had the occasion to glance. Oh my God. Closing in 50 billion US dollars, if you see the top list. Why don’t we have it?…..We have alumni. Let our alumni pour in the corpus. Amount doesn’t matter. It is the spirit of contribution that will generate a connect with the Institute. A pride for them also”.
“I have mooted an idea. I hope someone takes it. We have institutes of excellence, IITs, IIMs and other institutes. Their alumni associations must form into a confederation of associations of alumni. It will be a top world benchmark think tank for policy making. It can spur research and innovation”, he added.
Urging the corporates to invest in research and innovation, he said, “ First our corporates. I am not critical of them, I am critique. They must invest in research, they must invest in research for development and innovation. They must compete with global giants because this investment is not for the beneficiary student boy or girl of your institute or other institutes. It is for benefit of our present, our future and trust me, we have had a big change in our strategic system globally. Conventional war system has collapsed, it is diplomacy that defines. Innovation, research give us great cutting edge in soft diplomacy. We become a great power. Therefore, I appeal from this podium, corporates, examine what your peers are doing in the West. Please come closer to them”.
