New Delhi: The Central Government’s ambitious PM Gati Shakti scheme may soon become part of the academic curricular of higher studies. The purpose of including PM Gati Shakti scheme in the syllabus is to create skilled workforce for seamless execution of infrastructure projects taken up under the programme.
Underlining the importance of the PM Gati Shakti scheme in powering growth story of the country, Union Education Secretary K Sanjay Murthy on Tuesday called up on academic institutions to incorporate the study of the scheme in their syllabus.
“Education institutions need to contribute to training of students and industry professionals. They must realise the importance of this initiative and play a significant role in bringing about change through quality knowledge dissemination and relevant researches in logistics and infrastructure sectors,” said Murthy.
He was speaking at an online workshop on “Leveraging Satellite communication, Geo-informatics, and geospatial technology for urban planning and to promote multimodal logistics” organized by the National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE), Mumbai in association with the Ministry of Education and Bhaskaracharya National Institute for Space Applications and Geo-informatics (BISAG-N).
The PM Gatishakti is a national master plan for multi-modal connectivity, unveiled in October 2021. It is an effort aiming at coordinating infrastructure project planning and implementation. The intention of the Indian government behind this ambitious scheme is to reduce logistical costs.
Referring to the conference of Chief Secretaries in Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh, last week, Murthy said that PM Narendra Modi always emphasised on leveraging capabilities of Gati Shakti platform by all the State Governments to scale up their efficiency and economy. “Now, Gati Shakti is being talked about in business and infrastructure circles,” he added.
The Education Secretary appreciated the initiatives taken by NITIE under the leadership of M K Tiwari as its Director for creating a model curriculum and courses related to logistics and supply chain management, which could be replicated by other premier institutions. NITIE, Mumbai, is the Nodal Hub for capacity Building in Logistics and Supply Chain Management.
He also advised All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) to bring out comprehensive course curricula for different subjects for training of faculty members.
TP Singh, Director General, BISAG N, made detailed presentation on the application of Geo/Spatial and emerging technologies for the integrated management of multimodal transport. Vice Chairman of AICTE Poonia underlined the need for capacity building for faculty in the field.
During the workshop, institutions were told to encourage use the platform developed by BISAG N and carry out research work, projects, internship etc. and strengthen the platform for applications including infrastructure development.
The participants said that the institutes should lay stress on introducing relevant syllabus through interdisciplinary courses in logistics and supply chain and integrating emerging technologies to remove silos among the different departments, which form the vitals of PM Gati Shati scheme. Workable and pragmatic coordination and integration to synchronize New Education Policy 2020 and PM Gati Shakti mission requirements, they added.
Giving an introductory note of the workshop, Manoj Kumar Tiwari, Director NITIE, explained the relevance and scope of the PM Gati Shakti Master Plan and gave a broad overview to promote PM Gati Shakti plan through NEP 2020. The workshop, organised as part of the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav celebration under PM Gati Shakti Scheme, was attended by many eminent directors of IITs, IIMs, NITs and CFTIS. It started with the welcome address by Seema Unnikrishnan of NITIE.
