President Pranab Mukherjee Sunday said people enjoying the privilege of education must provide pidend to the society as their obligation for the society's upliftment."Whatever we are today, we are after all the products of the social investment. The society has invested in us to become lawyers, teachers, doctors etc. Therefore, the society must expect a pidend from us and we should fulfill the expectation of society by paying the pidend in making up our contribution to the upliftment of the society," Mukherjee said in his keynote address during the golden jubilee celebration of Ramadevi Mahavidyalaya here.He said people enjoying the privilege of education must contribute to teach uneducated people in society.Mukherjee rued that India was lagging behind in providing quality higher education even though about two crore students were enrolled every year and the education sector was expanding.
He said that while India has 723 universities and thousands of institutions, not a single one found a place in the list of the world's top 200 institutes.Citing examples of the ancient Nalanda and Takshashila universities which gave great scholars, the president emphasised on the need to check brain drain of Indian researchers to foreign institutes and urged everyone to take a vow to reverse the situation.Mukherjee said he has expressed his disappointment on several occasions at almost every academic programme he has attended over the past few years that no Indian educational institution has been recognized internationally.
Urging students to practice the thoughts and ideas of freedom fighter Ramadevi, the president said: "Ramadevi recognised that three 'Es' are essential for the empowerment of women -- education, emancipation and empowerment."Therefore, there must be education, which will empower them to achieve ultimate emancipation and they will be able to contribute equally, if not more, with their male partners in building up a society and in building up a nation."