Hyderabad: Role of SDGs for equitable growth trajectory stressed

Hyderabad: "In the United Nations Sustainable Development Summit, held in September 2015, 193 member countries, including India, agreed to implement 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) relating to People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace and Partnership.

The government, therefore, has formulated a number of innovative schemes to achieve the SDGs and thereby to give a big boost to inclusive and equitable growth trajectory of the country," said Dr A K Jain, Principal Consultant, NITI Aayog, in his keynote address at a national virtual conference on 'Driving Sustainable Development through Higher Education in the Wake of Covid 19 Pandemic,' jointly conducted by Dr MCR HRD Institute & RBVRR Women's College.

Over 300 academicians from Universities and leading institutions, both from India and abroad, participated in the Conference.

Dr Jain said that achieving the goals of sustainable development calls for concerted efforts not only on the part of the government but also corporate sector, civil society, NGOs, SHGs, and people at large.

He called upon educational institutions to sensitise different stakeholders, including students, in order to ensure that achieving the SDGs becomes a people-centric campaign.

Professor V Venkataramana, the Vice-Chairman of TS Council for Higher Education, called upon educational institutions to adopt a holistic approach and equip students with skill to think out-of-the-box and to innovate in order to empower them to play a much broader role in society.

"Restructuring curriculum, redesigning teaching methodologies, enhancing relevance of courses, and carrying out multidisciplinary research have assumed greater importance in the preset-day world of education", he stated and applauded multiple schemes of Government of Telangana aimed at promoting education, especially among girls.

P K Sharma, Chief Consultant at the HRD Institute, gave a call to achieve all the 17 SDGs, rather than merely 4 SDGs indicated in the SDG Matrix, in order to achieve the goal of environment and bio-diversity conservation.

He said that effective implementation of the plan of action, proposed by the experts at John Miller Rochester Institute of Technology, will result in sustainability of environment.

B P Acharya, DG of the Institute, spoke of the cherished goals of SDGs in a large number of villages across the length and breadth of the country, rather than in a few urban centers.

Acharya added that the government commitment to fully realise the dream of Bangaru Telangana was a step in the right direction as this would, inter alia, result in achieving all the SDGs.

Divya Parmar, Head (SDGs) at the Institute, Prof K Muthyam Reddy, the Secretary of HMVS, Dr J Achyutha Devi, the Principal of RBVRR Women's College, and P Vijaya, Coordinator of IQAC & Program Convener, also spoke.