India must emerge as higher education destination, says President Mukherjee

New Delhi: India must emerge as a higher education destination, President Pranab Mukherjee has said while emphasising educational institutes to focus on improving the quality of teaching. Addressing the concluding session of first ever three- day Visitor's conference at Rashtrapati Bhavan on Friday, the President expressed hope that by 2016, India will have at least five central higher educational institutions (CHEIs) in world's top 200.

He said that India must emerge as a higher education destination. Mukherjee was confident that CHEIs will now open their wings to scale new heights, according to a press release issued on Saturday by the President's office. The President urged those present to segregate the initiatives which do not require any funds and are within the control of the institutions themselves from the ones which need additional funding.

Mukherjee said that 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 utilisation of the existing infrastructure.

He emphasised that if we work on these with renewed vigour, the results will be highly rewarding, it said. The President 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 Human Resource Development 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. Mukherjee said that innovator, entrepreneur and financier 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.

Among the dignitaries present in the concluding session were Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Shipping, Road Transport and Highways; Smriti Irani, Minister of Human Resource Development and Hansraj Gangaram Ahir, Minister of State for Chemicals and Fertilizers.