Research And Innovation Too Far For India To Reach

New Delhi, India: President Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday who attended the Convocation program of National Institute of Technology said that a lot needs to be done in order to expand research and innovation activities as India is yet lagging much behind many other countries like China and Japan.

He also attributed the "Remarkable Resilience" in handling the economic meltdown partly to its strong foundation in higher education sector. He also said that the country must raise the standards of higher education to a level benefiting its growing economic power status.

"Though India's growth rate had slightly contracted since 2010-11 in the face of global economic meltdown, India has been able to withstand the crisis and has shown a remarkable resilience in handling the economy. It pales in comparison to over 3 lakh applications by Chinese, around 1.7 lakh filed by Germans, 4.64 lakh filed by Japanese and 4.2 lakh filed by Americans".

He was at-most disappointed for the universities of India, that not a single Indian University or Institute of Higher Education was present in the list of top 200 Universities in the World.