Hyderabad: A delegation from Sweden visited the University of Hyderabad (UoH) on Thursday. Prof. B J Rao, Vice-Chancellor, welcomed the delegation at the School of Life Sciences. The idea is to strengthen present linkages between Indian and Swedish H.E.I.s and explore collaboration opportunities and new strategic partnerships in the context of National Education Policy 2020. A supplementary aim is to scale up researcher mobility between Sweden and India.
Dr Per Arne Wikstrom, Counsellor, Office of Science and Innovation, Embassy of Sweden in India, gave a presentation on Research, Innovation. In his presentation on “Innovative Sweden”, Dr Wikstrom said, ‘Sweden has a special interest in India with focus on Science, Technology and Innovation’.
Giving insights into the research and innovation in Sweden, he said there are 3% of Top 100 institutions in the country compared with only 0.13% of the World’s population residing in Sweden. Dr Wikstrom also added that 17.50 million USD funding opportunities are committed and matched by the Government of India contributors.
Prof.Chetan Srivastava, Director, Office for International Affairs, University of Hyderabad, welcomed the delegation and apprised them about the philosophy of India, where the whole world is a family and of common good as well as happiness for all. He apprised the delegation that the University of Hyderabad has been always a pioneer in extending its academic and research across the globe and that the University has been collaborating with Nordic Nations since quite a long time and this meeting & interaction today was to explore further areas and dimensions of expanding our academic & research activities and taking the existing activities to a newer and higher orbits and this platform is to further strengthen our collaboration and explore the areas of common interests, globally & socially relevant areas of research and contribute to the world at large and humanity. He also stressed on the fact that NEP also envisages the same and gives a lot of freedom & flexibility for internationalization of academic institutions.
Andreas Christer Larsson, Deputy Vice Chancellor, Blekinge Institute of Technology, Jan Örjan Johansson , Professor, Luleå University of Technology, Lena Birgitta Gumaelius, Pro-Vice Chancellor, Mälardalen University, Helena Elisabet Jerregård, Vice chancellor, Mälardalen University, Rajeev Thottappillil, Professor, Director, International Relations, KTH Royal Institute of Technology; Christabel Royan, Director, Nordic Centre in India and others presented about their respective institutions and were keen on the academic collaboration with University of Hyderabad.
Prof. BJ Rao, Vice Chancellor, University of Hyderabad, in his presentation gave insights into the strengths, significant research infrastructure and achievements of the University. ‘Nordic regions, Sweden and UoH/India need to grow. We must formalise linkages, faculty/student exchange, collaborative grants and also look at awarding combined degrees in future through an official MoU’, he added.
The Deans of the various Schools in the university gave a short presentation on their strengths and areas of research. The meeting was attended by Research Director, Dr. Samrat L Sabat and Dr. Ghanshyam Krishna, Director-Institution of Eminence (IoE).
The visit has been coordinated by the Office of International Affairs (OIA) headed by Prof. Chetan Srivastava, Director, Office for International Affairs. The Formal of Vote of Thanks was proposed by Dr. Alok Mishra, Associate Director, OIA.
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