Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Saturday asked the management students of BITS Pilani to undertake case studies of five principles of the Union government’s functioning with regards to governance and management of the economy, which she said needed to be highlighted.
“You should look at a case study as to how India has come out of Covid, faced two challenging wars (Ukraine-Russia war and the Israel-Gaza war) that are happening simultaneously and overcome the Red Sea piracy-related uncertainties to emerge as the world’s fastest growing economy,” the FM told students while inaugurating the BITS Pilani Mumbai Campus at Kalyan in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR).
“It should be an interesting case study how a ‘minimum government and maximum governance’ model which we have taken up from 2014 has enabled us to be receptive to public suggestions and met the expectations of the people.”
“Transparency has been the biggest asset in the government and it is completely rid of corruption. We adopted technology and using technology in every transaction we were able to scale up the digital public infrastructure,” she said.
She said case studies may be conducted into the subject of Systems Thinking, wherein the government as a whole thinks like an organisation to improve efficiency; the use of feed back to redress grievances; the output outcome monitoring framework of the government which monitors the outcome of every rupee spent and finally the adoption of Japanese business philosophy of Kaizen for relentless delivery of Government services to the poorest of the poor.
The FM said the Centre was investing in semiconductor technologies (in terms of manufacturing, designing and packaging) in a big way. “Today there are 3 to 4 states and probably the 5th one is going to come in next few weeks. Semi conductor investments are greatly supported by the government,” she said.
Stating that “innovative from India and innovate for India” was the motto with which the present government had worked, she said that in the latest budget she had announced that there would be a corpus of ₹1 lakh crore for a special purpose vehicle which would be funding innovations and research & development activities.
She also praised the educational institution for its pioneering role in nation building.
This is the 5th campus of the storied educational institution which will house its management school (BITSoM), law school (BITSLAW), and design school (BITSDES).
Spread over 63 acres and with an investment of ₹1,500 crore, it is a future-ready, all-residential campus designed to accommodate 5,000 students at peak capacity.
Kumar Mangalam Birla, Chancellor, BITS Pilani, said, “At BITS, we stand at the precipice of blending India’s rich heritage of education with new-age knowledge systems and modern learning environments. This globally benchmarked campus is a visible marker of India’s growing intellectual prowess and a symbol of BITS Pilani’s whole-hearted embrace of multi-disciplinary education and innovation.”
“I am certain that the new campus will create an enabling environment that sparks creativity, excellence, and collaboration, emerging in the process as a talent factory for New India,” he added.
With a vision to work towards a zero-carbon footprint, it has been built on a zero-discharge scheme with 100% recycled water utilisation, energy-saving lighting systems and solar power.
This digital-first campus has state-of-the-art infrastructure for classrooms, multimedia studios (including video and podcast rooms), and a start-up incubation centre. It boasts of 80% open, aesthetically landscaped lush green spaces, and sports and recreation facilities for students.
