Prez Calls For Efforts To Take Out Over 250 Mn From Clutches Of Poverty

10 January, Ranchi

President Pranab Mukherjee Sunday said despite the rapid achievements made by the country after Independence, one cannot lose the sight of the fact that over 250 million people in the country languish at subsistence level of poverty and the task of taking out these people out of poverty ‘may be daunting, but possible’.

Addressing the Diamond Jubilee Celebrations and the 20th convocation ceremony of Birla Institute of Technology Mesra here, he said, “Our socio-economic progress has to be tampered with a commitment to equitable distribution of its fruits to all sections of our society, particularly the backward, less privileged and the disadvantaged,” he said.

When India became Independent in 1947, the nation embarked upon a programme of sustained economic development, comprising rapid industrialisation, improved agriculture, balanced regional development and reduction in import dependence.”We can be proud of our achievements, that from producing barely one million tonne of steel at the time of Independence, we now produce 90 million tonnes to steel annually, making us the fourth largest steel producing nation.

“From less than one lakh automobiles per year in 1947, we are now the sixth largest producer of automobiles and at 612 million tonnes in 2014-15, were the third largest producer of coal and at 270 million tonnes last year, we were second, only behind China in the production of cement,” he said. India was the fastest growing market for electronic goods.

The country was also the ninth largest economy in the world in dollar terms with GDP of over two trillion US dollars while in terms of purchase power parity, the country was the third largest economy. ”Among the large economies of the worlds we are the fastest growing,” the President pointed out.

”This impressive growth of our nation is a cause for genuine pride for all of us. Engineering institutions like BIT Mesra have also contributed to this advancement through well-trained technologists at all levels of leadership.”It is a matter of great satisfaction for this institute that it counts amongst its alumni, several corporate leaders, scientists, engineers and public servants.”

Apart from technocrats manning industrial firms, it has provided a large pool of entrepreneurs in diverse areas, ranging from computer software, networking hardware, efficient mining machinery gas and power,” he added.