Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday said the education infrastructure in the country had grown manifold since the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government came into power in 2014.
Delivering the convocation address at the 13th convocation of VELS Institute of Science, Technology and Advanced Studies (VISTAS) in Chennai she contended the country was now seeing new institutions at the rate of one university every week, one Atal Tinkering Lab every third day, one college every second day and one Industrial Training Institute (ITI) every day and one Indian Institute of Technology every year.
Moreover, she said the number of seats for MBBS seats have nearly doubled in the last nine years. All these indicated the importance being given to education by the government.
With the government’s support towards innovation, she said the number of patents getting approved every year has increased from 4,000 per year until 2014 to 30,000 per year now. Similarly, trade marks getting registered has increased from 70,000 per year to 2.5 lakh per year now.
She said the government was also focussing on skill development and employment. While 4.38 lakh youths have been provided employment through six rozgar melas organised till now, she said the number of government employments provided will increased to 10 lakh by 2024.
According to the Minister, some of the deals signed during Mr. Modi’s recent visit to the United States were likely to bring more employment to youngsters of Chennai and surrounding regions. With India now becoming a knowledge hub, students graduating with good degrees had plenty of knowledge-intense work and opportunities to benefit from and to contribute to the country.
Besides the graduating students of the institutions who received their degrees in various disciplines, Anju Bobby George, vice president, Athletics Federation of India, Girish Mathrubootham, founder and CEO, Freshworks, R.S. Munirathnam, chairman, RMK Group of Institutions, and M. Ramakrishnan, professor, Department of Urology, Hindusthan Hospital were conferred honorary doctorates (honoris causa) during the convocation.
