Inter-University North Zone Youth Festival concludes
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Feb 4: Four-day 36th Inter-University North Zone Youth Festival, ANTARNAAD at Jammu University, concluded today with an impressive valedictory function amid award distribution by Anurag Thakur, Union Minister of Sports, Youth Affairs and Minister of Information and Broadcasting, who was chief guest on the occasion.
Praising Jammu University for its overall contribution in research & development and having A+ NAAC accreditation, Thakur said, Information & Broadcasting Ministry, Government of India was ready to help Jammu University in the development of lab, in research and development in the course of Journalism.
Chandigarh University, Maholi was declared Overall Champion of the mega event, which was organized under the aegis of the Association of Indian Universities (AIU). Lovely Professional University Phagwara and Punjab University Chandigarh were declared as Ist and 2nd Runner up, respectively. Around one thousand students of 18 universities from J&K and across the Northern India participated in the Youth Festival, during which several literary, musical and fine arts competitions were held.
Speaking on the occasion of valedictory function, Anurag Thakur said that it has been possible only because of contribution of the youth that India is now the hub of ‘Start-up’ ecosystem in the world, ranking third with 90,000 ‘Start-Ups’, 107 unicorn companies worth 30 billion dollars.
“The world is looking towards New India under Prime Minister Narendra Modi as we are now the biggest exporter of vaccines, biggest exporter of mobile phones and defence equipments which can be judged from the fact that India now exports mobile phones worth one lakh crore, defence equipments worth 16 thousand crores this year. This is the picture of New India leading everywhere in every field from last eight years,” he added.
Praising various performances of the youth during the festival, Thakur said that India has a great history with rich culture, art and tradition and the youth of this country have a great responsibility to preserve this culture, art and tradition which is not seen anywhere in the world.
Stressing on the five resolves put forward by PM Narendra Modi, Thakur said, in the recently announced Amrit Kaal Budget by the Union Finance Minister, the budget has the best provisions for the youth of this country as 47 lakh youth will be provided with the stipend, 30 Skill India International Centres will be established, 3 centres of Excellence for Artificial Intelligence will be established training youth in 3D printing, AI, Internet of Things etc making them skilled and future ready in diverse modern fields.
During the valedictory function, the Minister also felicitated Padma Shree Awardees of Jammu, who included Jitender Udhampuri, Rajinder Tikoo, S P Verma, Mohan Singh Slathia and Balwant Thakur.
Earlier, JU Vice-Chancellor Prof Umesh Rai, also spoke on the occasion and lauded the spirit of the students from various universities who took part in the Youth Festival.
Welcome address was delivered by Prof Prakash Antahal, Dean Students Welfare, JU & Organising Secretary, Antarnaad while vote of thanks was presented by Prof Vishav Raksha, Chairperson, Campus Cultural Committee & Coordinator, Antarnaad.
The valedictory function was also attended by Prof Bechan Lal, VC Cluster University, Jammu; Dr Baljeet Singh, Joint Secretary, AIU; Professor Naresh Padha, DAA JU; S D Jamwal, ADGP Security, Jammu; Mukesh Singh, ADGP Jammu and Ravinder Raina, President BJP J&K and others.
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