Obama, Singh seal higher education summit to take forward ties

India and the US will hold a first ever official higher education summit next year to take forward their ties in the sector, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and American President Barack Obama announced on Monday. HT had first reported – on November 5 -- that India and the US were discussing


the proposal for summit level talks between the two countries as a deliverable from Obama's visit.
The summit level talks will witness top leaders of the two countries discuss areas of cooperation and concerns and is aimed at providing greater momentum to reforms that can facilitate further deepening of ties in the sector, sources said.

Indian American groups and societies have held Indo-US conferences on higher education in the past, including one in Mumbai earlier this year. The summit next year will be the first time that the governments of the two countries will hold summit level talks on the subject, reflecting the uniqueness of their relationship in the sectror, sources said.

"Cooperation in the field of education holds great promise because no two other countries
are better equipped to be partners in building the knowledge economy of the future," the Prime Minister said today, in opening remarks at a joint press conference with Obama at Hyderabad House.

Obama said the summit and the Singh-Obama 21st Century Knowledge Initiative which the two leaders announced last November during the PM's visit to the US, were key indicators of the deepening Indo-US ties in education.

Both Singh and Obama are understood to have emphasized the need to focus on collaboration in education as a key component of the Indo-US partnership which both leaders have defined as one of the "defining partnerships of the 21st century."

Human resource development minister Kapil Sibal was a part of the delegation level talks at Hyderabad House today where the proposal for the higher education summit – moved by the US – was finalized.

The presence of several US university presidents in Obama's delegation is a key indicator of the role of education in the partnership between the two countries, sources said. Close to 100,000 Indian students are studying in US higher educational institutions and research laboratories.

The presidents of the University of Pennsylvania, Stanford University, Cornell University and senior representatives of Boston University, Arizona State University and Rutgers University are a part of Obama's delegation.

Hindustantimes