Prime Minister Lays Emphasis On Tech-Driven Future

-
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s inaugural address at the Bengaluru Tech Summit 2020; brought out the Indian government’s commitment to integrate technology into governance to deliver better services to all. He described technology as the prime reason our schemes have gone beyond files and have impacted the lives of Indians at a rapid speed and on a larger scale. The government has made technology a key part of all schemes and built its governance model on a ‘tech-first’ approach. Mr.Modi said the amount of tech adoption that has happened in the last few months may not have happened in a decade. “We are now in the middle of the information era, where change is disruptive”. Prime Minister observed.

He said, this also gives us the confidence that we can vaccinate a large population of people against the COVID-19 virus in a short period of time. The Prime Minister also urged the youth to play a bigger role in devising robust cyber security solutions that will effectively vaccinate against cyber-attacks and viruses.

In this context, it may be mentioned that technology is also helping organise this important summit in a virtual manner, in view of the ongoing COVID pandemic. “Digital India”, launched five years ago, is no more just a government initiative – it has become a way of life. It has allowed the nation to experience a more human-centric approach to development.

The Bengaluru Tech Summit is one of the oldest and most definitive events in the ICT, electronics, and biotechnology sector held annually in India. The Summit is organised by the Government of Karnataka along with Karnataka Innovation and Technology Society – Karnataka government’s Vision Group on Information Technology, Biotechnology and Start-ups–and Software Technology Parks of India. Today in its 23rd year, the event has become the place of convergence for the leading cross-sector tech companies to start-ups, technocrats to young innovators, policymakers to investors, researchers to academia, facilitating dialogue and collaborations.

This year, the theme of the summit is “Next is Now” and deliberations will be centred around the key challenges emerging in the post-pandemic world with a focus on the impact of prominent technologies and innovations in the domains of ‘Information Technology and Electronics’ and ‘Biotechnology’. 

The 3-day event will have four tracks on major themes, namely ‘Knowledge Hub’, ‘Innovation Corner’, ‘One Health’, and ‘Country Sessions’. Some of the key focus areas of the summit are aero-space and defence technologies, healthcare, future of work, start-up for public good,electronics and semi-conductors, reimagining digital health and COVID-19 pandemic preparedness, among others.

Global Innovation Alliance, a partnership initiative of Karnataka, will feature 15 countries which will conduct country sessions at the summit. These include Canada, Finland, France, Israel, the Netherlands, UK, Australia, Germany, Sweden, Taiwan, Switzerland, Denmark, Bahrain, Japan and Lithuania.

The Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who was also present at the inauguration (virtually), said that under the Indo-Australian partnership agreement signed in June, the two countries will be working on cyber and enabled technologies, a foundation for the digital economy. The two countries are set to launch the Australia-India cyber and critical technology partnership grant programme where experts from both countries will work on technology, framework and best practice standards.

The Consul-General of the Netherlands in Bengaluru, Gert Heijkoop said the Bengaluru Tech Summit is the perfect platform to bring the strategic ties between our two countries to an even higher level. The Hague Business Agency will launch a digital soft-landing program for Indian start-ups, during this year’s summit.

In the next couple of days, the event will see the world’s best minds streaming their vision, leaders forecasting the future, technocrats unravelling new products, and start-ups presenting cutting-edge ideas–towards a true tech-driven future.

Script: Biman Basu, Senior Science Commentator

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Data Darbar Suicide Attack

-
The deadly attack on the famous Sufi shrine Data Darbar in Lahore on the second day of the holy month of Ramadan that killed 10 and injured more than 25 people is yet another ghastly reminder that Pakistan still shelters terrorist groups that have now come to haunt its own State. The suicide bombing was apparently targeted towards the elite security force that was assigned to guard the Shrine as the inflow of devotees increase during Ramadan. This is not the first time a Sufi Shrine was targeted by terrorists in Pakistan. Many Shrines like Lal Shahbaz Qalandar in Sehwan, Baba Farid in Pakpattan and Abdullah Shah Ghazi in Karachi were attacked in the past. The Sufi nature of these shrines has made them an easy target of the terrorist groups that consider Sufis to be heretics. The terror organisations within Pakistan such as the Pakistan Taliban, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and Hizbul Ahrar (said to be a splinter faction of the local Taliban) that took responsibility for the latest bombings in
Read more

US Needs To Relook Into Talks With The Taliban

-
The US has deviated from its resolve to root out terrorism in any form. From July last year it has entered into a dialogue with Taliban. The sixth round of these talks began in Doha, Qatar last week and is still underway. The talks have not yielded any result so far. US Special Envoy for the talks, Zalmay Khalilzad is reported to have said that the talks revolve around withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, guarantees against terrorism, ensuring negotiations between Taliban and Afghanistan government for initiation of political settlement and a lasting cease fire. Direct involvement of US in Afghanistan dates back seventeen years to September 2001; when terrorists attacked twin towers of the World Trade Centre in New York. Following this, America had declared a war against terrorism. It vowed to punish Al Qaeda and its leader Osama Bin Laden, whom it considered to be behind the attacks on American soil. It also declared to root out Taliban from Afghanistan for providing safe
Read more

India To Roll Out The World’s Biggest Covid19 Vaccination Drive

-
India will begin inoculating its 1.3 billion population against coronavirus starting January 16, in one of the world’s massive rollouts. The first phase of this daunting and complex task will cover 30 million frontline and health workers. This will be followed by the vaccination of 270 million people above 50 years of age and the under-50 population groups with co-morbidities or with high risk of infection. The aim is to vaccinate 300 million, equal almost to the entire US population, by July. This will be an unprecedented scale of immunisation. From developing, manufacturing to becoming a key supplier, India will play a crucial role in the global immunisation programme with two “Made in India” vaccines—Covaxin and Covishield. Covaxin, India’s first indigenous vaccine against Covid 19, is manufactured by the Hyderabad-based pharma company Bharat Biotech. The second, Covishield, was developed jointly by Oxford University and AstraZeneca, and is manufactured by the Serum Institute of Ind
Read more