01:23Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, and I would like to say only ladies and gentlemen,
01:38since our students are all young ladies and gentlemen already here, sir. Honorable speaker, sir,
01:45Secretary General Sahib, colleagues from the Lok Sabha delegation and from our High Commission,
01:51thank you all for being here and a very happy new year to our students in particular.
01:56Sir, this is the first weekend of the current year. Our students have just come back after their
02:04holidays and break and of course to a whole new term of work at their universities.
02:12The UK has something like 173,000 students from India,
02:21constituting the largest group of foreign students today. Our students are across all of the
02:28nations of the UK, the largest group being in England at somewhere near 150,000 students.
02:36There are students in Wales, there are students in Scotland and there are students in Northern
02:41Ireland as well. Our students are engaged in all of the major universities,
02:46in most of the major disciplines including STEM subjects, including economics and
02:51business management, including medicine and dentistry, engineering, in arts,
02:57in all of the subjects where they come here to find opportunities to give themselves the best possible skills
03:05to lead India and indeed be world leaders in the years ahead. Our students, sir, are one of the biggest drivers of the India-UK living bridge.
03:17Through their efforts, the next generation of inventors, investors and artists will come.
03:25Through their efforts, sir, we look forward to their contributions to a developed India, to a Viksar Bharat,
03:32to an India in which our students, our young people will find new opportunities and new places to create the best possible
03:41businesses and the best possible opportunities for the generations that follow them in India.
03:47In our country today, as a result of the policies that our government has taken, we now have new
03:54opportunities for universities from the UK and elsewhere in the world to open up campuses, to offer degrees and to take up
04:02new educational creativity opportunities within India. Indeed, the first foreign university to obtain a letter of intent from our Ministry of Education
04:13to open a new Greenfield campus in India comes from the UK, the University of Southampton.
04:19We hope that with our students' drive, energy and vigour, more UK universities will look for an opportunity to do
04:28what we hope will give our students, our young people, the best possible opportunities in our country.
04:34The group here, sir, is around 180 students. They come from the universities largely in the London area.
04:43I believe, my colleagues will correct me if I am wrong, about some 30 universities in the London area. Of course, we have many more students outside London,
04:53but given the time available and given the season, it would have been difficult for us to reach out to all of them.
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