Consolidate strengths, up confi dence: Sridhar

CHENNAI: Additional Chief Secretary to Government of Tamil Nadu Department of Higher Education T S Sridhar on Sunday exhorted young graduates to consolidate their strengths and enhance their potential and confi dence. Delivering the 12th Graduation Day Address at the Easwari Engineering College, part of SRM Group of Institutions here, he said since Indian industry had become globally competitive, it required people with technical skill sets which were globally benchmarked and sourced. “This will result in both Indian and foreign industrial R and D centres vying with one another to seek the best brains. ” Young graduates should consolidate their strengths, build up and enhance their potential and confi dence and fi t into these spheres”, he added. Noting India would be one among the top economies of the globe, he reminded Goldman Sachs predictions for 2050 that the sub-continent would be fi nding place among top countries like China and USA. “Youngsters of today have a high stake in taking the nation to glory amidst such bright prospects,” he added. ‘While these are greener aspects of our future, the young minds have to be aware of the other side too. ‘These are times for swift change. In this period of fl ux, we always look to education for solutions as education alone would enable you with abilities to be responsive to change,’ he said. In his address, SRM Group of Institutions Chancellor T R Pachamuthu said focus on enhancing employability among young graduates must be a matter of high attention ‘There are about 3000 engineering colleges across the nation with over fi ve Lakh graduating every year. ‘About 250 engineering colleges are in Tamil Nadu and about 1.5 lakh student graduate every year. ‘But only about 10 per cent of them are employable,’ he added. In all, 818 students received their degrees and awards out of which 581 were from under graduate stream and 237 from post graduate stream. A total of 17 students from under graduation and 10 from post graduation achieved Anna university ranks with Ms Jayachitra of ME (EEE) securing the Gold Medal. - stalin