Venkaiah Naidu to youth: Return back home, serve nation
'India was a Vishwaguru at one time. But now, we are looking at the West'
Hyderabad: Union minister of urban development M. Venkaiah Naidu called on the young people, who have gone abroad seeking greener pastures, to return home and contribute to nation building, in the process, give back to the society. Mr Naidu was speaking at the closing ceremony of the year-long programme of the 70th anniversary of the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology here on Thursday.
“There is nothing wrong in going aboard. Go, but learn, earn and return. At the end of the day, you have to come back and serve you motherland. Only then you will be happy and only then will society recognise you,” he said.
“There is knowledge and talent in everybody in this country. People born in this country have gone to the United States and other western countries. Almost half the doctors in America are Indians,” he said He underlined that India had great tradition of knowledge in different fields.
“India was a Vishwaguru at one time. But now, we are looking at the West,” Mr Naidu said. “We have lost the momentum and flow and have come to depend on other countries even for basic research and attendant technologies,” said Mr Naidu. “Our neighbour, China, which lagged behind us even a few decades ago, is now far ahead of us. I feel, as a nation, we lacked focus and a sense of purpose.
To a great extent, our leadership is to be blamed for this. We need to reinvent and place ourselves in the forefront of education, research, technology and development,” he added. Union minister of state for science and technology, Jitendra Singh said, “We have to encourage young scientists. We must try and catch them young to ensure better quality of scientists.”