President expressing satisfaction over economic growth

President Pranab Mukherjee today expressed satisfaction over the country's economic growth, saying the 7.9% growth in one decade was not disappointing.
"India is now a recognised member of G-20 countries for our steady economic growth ... If we want to grow fast we must improve our technologies," he said addressing the fifth convocation of the National Institute of Technology (NIT), Agartala.
He said during the economic crisis of 2008-2009, even the USA could not recover. "But the economic growth of our country in the last one decade from 2003 to 2013 is 7.9%, which is not disappointing," Mukherjee said.
The President said there was shortage of facilities in the technical institutions and to fill up the gap e-education system should be developed.

Faculties from developing countries could also be appointed for short time like 7-10 days to get the facilities, he said and advised the technical institutions to build up collaboration with the local industries.
He lamented that not a single university, IIT or NIT has found place in the list of top 200 universities of the world, while for about 1,800 years from 600 BC to 1200 AD India had dominated the field of higher education.

"India was a prominent seat of learning in ancient times and those universities were visited by famous scholars like Panini, Chanakya and Kautilya," Mukherjee said.

It was also a matter of concern that only seven students out of 1,000 go for higher education in the country when this number is 21 for Germany and 34 for USA.
At present, 2.6 crore students in the country have higher education which would rise to 3.6 crore in the 12th plan.