Vice President of India, Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu inaugurated the year-long Diamond Jubilee celebrations of IIT Delhi via video conferencing on Monday in the presence of Union HRD Minister Shri Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ .

On this occasion, Vice President of India released the Diamond Jubilee logo and the institute’s strategy document- ‘IIT Delhi- Setting the Vision and Direction for 2030’.

While addressing the participants, Shri M Venkaiah Naidu today emphasized that research at IITs and other higher education institutes must be relevant to society and focus on finding solutions to various problems faced by mankind from climate change to health issues. He said Indian institutions will be counted among the world's best only when they start impacting the societies around them by developing optimal and sustainable solutions to the problems faced by the nation

Calling for greater investment in R & D projects which focus on finding solutions to societal problems, the Vice President urged the private sector to collaborate with the academia in identifying such projects and fund them liberally.

He also emphasised that research should focus on making the lives of people comfortable, quicken the progress and ensure a more equitable world order. Calling upon the IITians to pay attention to the problems faced by the farmers and rural India, Shri Naidu asked them to work not only for enhancing agri-production, but also specially focus on the production of nutritious and protein-rich food.

Asking the higher education institutions not to work in silos and form a symbiotic relationship with the industry to develop cutting-edge technology, he said the industry experts in various areas should act as mentors in guiding researchers. This type of collaboration will help in fast-tracking projects and produce quicker results, he added.  

Expressing his happiness that the New Education Policy seeks to promote India as a global study destination, Shri Naidu pointed out that only eight Indian institutions figured in the top 500 globally. He said this situation has to change and there has to be a concerted and collective action from all the stakeholders—governments, universities, educationists and the private sector to bring about a radical improvement in the standards and quality of education of our institutes of higher learning.

Observing that there is a huge potential for India to become a world leader in various technological domains given the demographic advantage and the presence of highly talented youth, the Vice President said “the need of the hour is to impart quality education”.

Lauding IIT Delhi for emerging as a leader in the entrepreneurship space, Shri Naidu was happy to note that Institutions such as IIT Delhi are producing job providers rather than job seekers and becoming trendsetters for other institutions in the country.

The Vice President of India concluded by praising IIT Delhi, the national coordinating institute for the MHRD’s flagship programmeUnnat Bharat Abhiyan (UBA), for playing a strong catalytic role. The UBA already has over 2000 Participating Institutions (PIs) and these institutions have adopted more than 10,000 villages.

Click here to see the full text of the speech of the Vice President:

Speaking on the occasion, Shri Pokhriyal expressed his gratitude to the Vice President of India for inaugurating the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of IIT Delhi. He said that the National Education Policy -2020 focuses on the quality of education in India and intends to make Indian education system the most advanced and modern for students of our Country. He added that new opportunities in higher education have now emerged as a result of this New Education Policy and India will become a global study destination witheffectiveimplementationoftheNEP-2020.

IIT Delhi Diamond Jubilee Celebrations (Virtual Inaugural Ceremony) - Release of the Diamond Jubilee Logo and Strategy Document of @iitdelhi by Hon'ble Vice President of India, Shri @MVenkaiahNaidu ji.@VPSecretariat @PIB_India @MIB_India @DDNewslive https://t.co/7pgLla6ljk

— Dr. Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank (@DrRPNishank) August 17, 2020

While congratulating IIT Delhi on its Diamond Jubilee the Minister said that the institute’s journey of glorious 60 years is of  great pride and inspiration for the entire country.  He said that the contributions of IIT Delhi in meeting the national challenge of fighting COVID-19 through technological support are praiseworthy. From developing the world’s cheapest RT-PCR-based COVID-19 diagnostic kit to supplying over 40 lakh PPEs to India and the world, the institute’s researchers have done a remarkable job.

The Minister was happy to note that over 500 patents have been filed by IIT Delhi faculty and students in the last 5 years in addition to publishing over 10000 research papers in peer reviewed international journals in the same period. IIT Delhi Research Project funding from competitive research grants has also grown 4 times in the last 5 years, from 100 crores per year in 2016 to over Rs. 400 crores in 2019.”

Shri Pokhriyal further said that the IIT Delhi has by far the best eco-system for start-ups in the country. I feel proud that IIT Delhi alumni have created close to 800 start-ups, the highest in the country as compared to alumni of any other institute. Of the close to 30 unicorns created by Indians, 15 of them are by IIT Delhi alumni alone. IIT Delhi alumni led start-ups have created over 30 million jobs and raised USD 19 Billion in investments and have been the trend setters in the country as well as in the world.

Director, IIT Delhi, Prof V. Ramgopal Rao said that With the vision for 2030 in place, IIT Delhi is on the road to its next phase of growth. The successful achievement of its vision will positively impact the lives of students, alumni, faculty and staff, while shaping the progress of our nation for decades tocome.

The second session of the Diamond Jubilee inaugural ceremony witnessed Inaugural Talks by Prof. Devangkhakhar, Distinguished Alumnus & Former Director, IIT Bombay and by Prof. M.Balakrishnan, Vice Chancellor, Satya Bharti Institute of Technology & Professor (On Leave), CSE, IIT Delhi. A panel discussion was also organised on "IIT Delhi: Reminiscing 60 Years of Excellence and Way Forward " in which former Directors of IIT Delhi Prof. V. S. Raju, Prof. R. S. Sirohi, Prof. Surendra Prasad and Prof. R. K. Shevgaonkar participated.

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NB/AKJ/AK