Address In Dadabhai Naoroji Memorial Award Function National Physical Laboratory

ADDRESS

I am indeed delighted to be here in this function to present the Dadabhai Naoroji Memorial Award. Dadabhai Naoroji is the Grand Old Man of India, who laid the foundation for our freedom movement in 1850s. My greetings to all of you. I was searching some thing unique about Dadabhai Naoroji. Of course we all cherish the contributions of that great personality. Nearly for half a century, he gave the definition of freedom fight. I have got an apt definition of him: "He was a man, more than anybody else, of pure thoughts, of pure speech and of pure deeds." We are here today to celebrate his thoughts and deeds by giving an award in his name - Dadabhai Naoroji Memorial Award.

To whom are we giving this award?. This award is being conferred to Dr. R.A. Mashelkar, who is an eminent scientist of India and widely known internationally. He has contributed in multiple fields. One unique contribution of Dr. Mashelkar, whom I know for more than a decade, is that he gave certain specific time bound programs to CSIR and accomplished them. Whether it is aircraft engineering or medicinal drug manufacturing, or certain unique nature of research, CSIR Labs are there with full interest and were giving results. We are celebrating his contributions and I am very happy to present this prestigious award.

On this occasion, I would like to share with you something that happened recently during Conference of Governors. One of the Agenda of that Conference was, "Discussion about Transforming India into a Developed Nation". During the Conference, our Prime Minister was mentioning that such developmental projects need mass movement and national focus orientation. He was looking for a word or tool that will take us to prosperity in future. He said, "The Vision for Developed India is a right tool". In the National Development Council, items like "Developed India" and "Transformation of India into a Developed Nation" have been discussed by the members which included all our state chief ministers and NDC has set a target of 8% GDP growth in this five year period.

The 'Golden Quadrangle' project and PM's Rural Road Development Projects will help to improve the rural connectivity. Also a task team has been formed for exploring the opportunities and possibilities of River Connectivity. All such projects will help in our aspirations to become developed India. When the nation is in developmental mode, the most important need of the country is an integrated developmental plan and empowered management structures in the areas of Education and Healthcare, Agriculture and Food Processing, Information and Communication Technology, Strategic Sectors and Infrastructure Industries. In addition, I would like to suggest various missions for our people. For example, the student community can take the task during holidays to remove the illiteracy of certain number of people in their area where their school or house are situated. Only a burning candle lights another. Teachers and parents can assist them in this task. The Government and R&D labs can provide technological upgradation to our small-scale industries so that production can be increased and be competitive. The large-scale industries have to increase their contribution for economic growth particularly GDP growth. Here, the industries can concentrate on maximum output and cost effective products, so that the demand will increase. They can aim to become multinational companies, for e.g. in the areas of sugar, power, cement and engineering and knowledge institutions. The farming community, where there are with dry land cultivation have to increase their productivity with the help of available new scientific methods. The Information Technology and knowledge workers have got a tremendous responsibility to contribute in the areas of tele-medicine, tele-education and e-governance for rural areas apart from their business role. In this vision period, the whole Government agency, has to build a name for itself, by fast decision making and transparent administration. Media has to become a partner and promoter critic in national development. This type of motivated environment will be indeed a great foundation for our vision of transforming India into a 'developed' nation.

My greetings to Dr. R.A. Mashelkar and best wishes to you all.