President Pranab Mukherjee has said that there is a need for India to emerge as a destination for higher education and expressed the hope that by next year, there should be at least five central higher educational institutions or CHEIs in the world's top 200.
He was confident that CHEIs will now open their wings to scale new heights.
The President urged those present to segregate initiatives which do not require any funds and are within the control of the institutions themselves from the ones that need additional funding.
He said some of these are regular up-dation and revision of the curriculum, improving the quality of teaching by adopting new methods, imparting education that will build the character and value system of the students, better maintenance and utilization of the existing infrastructure, etc.
He emphasized that if we work on these with renewed vigour, the results will be highly rewarding. He said that we could think of launching of Global Research Interactive Network (GRIN) as follow up to GIAN for funding research collaborations.
Mukherjee said that while he did see intensification of the involvement of alumni in the governance structure of the CHEIs, there is still a need to widen the area of interaction through sponsored research, endowment, setting up of chairs, donations, and in catalysing faculty recruitment.
He called upon Ministry of HRD to act quickly to set up a pro-active single window to help CHEIs to conclude agreements in line with existing administrative and legal systems.
He said that innovators, entrepreneurs and financiers are the three crucial players of an innovation eco-system. In the context of "Start-up India, Stand-up India", entrepreneurship acquires a new dimension, he added.
Union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Smriti Zubin Irani and Hansraj Gangaram Ahir were also present at the event held on Friday.
