Expressing concern over the effects of climate change Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday urged the students of IIT Kharagpur in West Bengal to develop infrastructure that can withstand natural disasters. He referred to the recent calamity in Uttarakhand in his virtual addressees at the 66th convocation of IIT Kharagpur.
The Prime Minister emphasized on the need to explore environment-friendly sources of energy through initiatives such as the International Solar Alliance.
“You know what recently happened in Uttarakhand. During major natural disasters apart from life infrastructure gets the most affected. The world looks up to India when it comes to disaster management… We need to focus on developing infrastructure that can withstand natural disasters,” said Modi.
The Prime Minister also said that India took the initiative in setting up the Coalition for Disaster Management Infrastructure at the United Nations. He said that India needed technology that was in one environment and user-friendly.
Referring to the fact that it was India that came up with the idea of the International Solar Alliance (ISA), the Prime Minister said even though the cost of per unit of solar power was very low in the country but there were several challenges in delivering solar power door to door.
“Can you (students) do something to ensure that solar cookers reach every household where earthen woven are still being used,” said Modi.
He urged the students to adopt the mantra of “ Self 3 which is Self-awareness, Self-confidence and Selflessness” to recognize their potential and move ahead with confidence and selflessness.
“In the 21st century the IITs need to be taken to the next level from the Indian Institutes of Technology to Institutes of Indigenous Technologies to fulfill the aspirations of New India,” said Modi.
The prime minister referred to the global Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure (CDRI), which he announced at the UN Climate Action Summit in 2019.
The CDRI envisages partnership of national governments, UN agencies and programmes, multilateral development banks, financing mechanisms, private sector, and knowledge institutions to promote the resilience of new and existing infrastructure systems to climate and disaster risks to ensure sustainable development.
He hailed the role played by the IITs in developing technology to battle Covid-19, and said the hallowed institutes should now work fast on finding futuristic solutions to other health care problems.
Lauding the IITs for developing technologies to battle against the Covid-19 pandemic the Prime Minister said that during the pandemic people keep devices at home that measures blood pressure and oxygen level in blood resulting into the emergence of a huge market of personal healthcare equipment.
“Now things have changed. Earlier people only kept medicines at home but now they also keep machines to measure blood pressure and oxygen level in blood. This has caused the emergence of a huge market of personal healthcare equipment,” said Modi.
"You have to become startups to bring about a change in the lives of people. You have to work on Self 3-- self-awareness, self-confidence and selflessness. You should recognise your potential and move forward, move ahead with full confidence, move ahead with selflessness," he told the students.
The prime minister spoke about the government liberalising regulations on geospatial data to allow private companies to conduct survey and mapping without prior government approvals and sharing the data for various everyday applications, from logistics and transport to road safety and e-commerce.
He said the decision will provide a huge impetus to Digital India and was a step forward in the direction of realising the vision 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat'.
(With inputs from PTI)