Tamil Nadu   

Kalam comes home to a rousing welcome

— Photo: S.R.Raghunathan

READY FOR HANDSHAKE: Former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam interacting with a child on the Anna University campus in Chennai on Thursday.

Chennai: It was a memorable homecoming for former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam on Thursday when he returned as professor to Anna University, his alma mater, after his tenure at the Rashtrapati Bhavan ended on Wednesday.

Addressing the faculty and then the research and postgraduate students in two separate sessions — both times to an overflowing auditorium — Mr. Kalam said he was delighted to be back and hoped to continue his teaching “for a very long time.”

Outlining a blueprint for his Vision 2020 project, he said economic development was not necessarily an indicator of national prosperity, unless it was linked to core civilisational values.

“Your life is your message,” he told the assembled faculty in the morning. “Inspire your students to greater heights and always bring in a new element to your daily lectures. Yours is a mission in building the capacity of our youth to face global competitiveness. Good research is good teaching and vice versa.”

“We have to develop local competencies as the latest technologies from the latest in scientific research in developed countries will not be made available to India for another ten years. You should focus on areas of research for the country’s inclusive development such as desalination options to meet water needs, making thorium-based nuclear reactors, forecasting heavy rainfall and predicting earthquakes,” he said.

An ideal profile of the nation in 2020 would be reduction of the rural-urban divide, equitable distribution of energy resources, development of the agricultural sector, equal access to education, healthcare and sanitation for all and a transparent, responsive and corruption-free administration.

Urging the faculty to make Anna University a “globally benchmarked research powerhouse,” Mr. Kalam also outlined possible areas of research such as increasing the efficiency of photovoltaic cells, technologies to be used in thorium-based nuclear reactors, stem cell research and prediction of disasters and rainfall.

The university should catalyse an entrepreneurial boom so that students became employment generators rather than job seekers. Brilliant minds among the academics should be identified and provided an enabling research environment.

“We need to develop a global human resource cadre,” he said.

Later, responding to questions from reporters, Mr. Kalam said he planned to divide his time equally between Nalanda University in Bihar, the upcoming space research university at Thiruvananthapuram, Anna University, Gandhigram Rural University and IIIT, Hyderabad. At Anna University, he planned to teach nanoscience, nanotechnology and convergence of technologies.

In the evening session, he outlined the parameters of a national prosperity index swhich included GDP growth, eradication of poverty and adoption of core values. As part of their project work, students should take up a study project to implement Provision of Urban Amenities in Rural Areas as a business proposition in villages.

Asked what his biggest achievement as President was, Mr. Kalam said it lay in turning the Rashtrapati Bhavan into a People’s Bhavan.

Later, he inaugurated an interactive website, www.abdulkalam.com, which contains a collection of his speeches and writings.

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