Australia’s strong ties with Indian educational institutions appreciated

CHENNAI: Australia has a
strong and growing relationship
with educational institutions
in India with focus
on excellence, Australian
Consul General in India
David Holly said today.
Speaking after signing of
a MoU between SRM University
and the University of
New South Wales, Australia,
he said “India is at the front
ranks (among top fi ve) of
Australia’s international
partnerships in higher education.
“We are proud of
the strategic partnership that
we have with India.
‘And it is the growing
strength of our bilateral education
partnership that has
resulted in both our Union
HRD Ministers meeting annually
and the establishment
of the Australia-India Education
Council”, he added.
Noting that these initiatives
would steer the joint partnerships
of both the countries
in higher education and vocational
training, Mr Holly
said in Tamil Nadu alone,
Australia has 38 active higher
education partnerships
and the one signed today
with SRM was 39th agreement.
He said Australia has
great empathy with the challenge
in India for providing
medical care in a community
or rural setting.
“Like governments and
hospitals in India, Australian
Governments and hospitals
are working to ensure that
demography and distance
won’t be the determinant of
Australia’s health, medical,
technology and community
medicine research which are
key parts to fi nding solutions
to this challenge”, he added.
He said it was nice that India
and Australia were continuing
the tradition of not
facing these challenges in
the delivery of medical care
alone.
“Today’s signing of MoU
between SRM and University
of New South Wales,
joins a long tradition of collaboration
that has assisted
each country in providing
community medical care,
particularly in rural and remote
settings”, he added.
Mr Holly said to encourage
research; the Australian
and Indian Governments
have established the Australia-
India Research Fund
which has a Rs 270 crore
commitment from the Australian
Government which
was matched by the Indian
Government.
“Currently, 60 separate
projects between Australia
and India’s premier Universities
and research institutions
are supported by the
Fund with projects in a wide
range of areas
like bio-tech, renewable energy,
agricultural science,
nano technology and astrophysics”,
he added.
The next phase under the
Fund was the “grand challenge”,
which focused on
energy, food and water security,
environment and health,
he said, adding, today’s
MoU would lead to greater
application in these areas.