Speech of Hon'ble CM at the Geospatial Awards in Hyderabad

Place :Hyderabad
Speech Date :18-01-2011
1. India is growing very fast and is poised to become one of the three bigge
st economies in the world.
2. Gujarat is a unique State in terms of its location and diversity
3. We must make our state not only the premier state in India, but a Global
model
4. It is my pleasure to offer a location for India's first Geospatial Techno
logy Park in the Gujarat State.
Winners of the Geospatial Awards, Policymakers, Administrators, Scientists and L
eaders of the Geospatial, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen!
I consider it a privilege to be here today among this galaxy of luminaries of th
e geospatial world. It is also quite exciting for me to give away the Geospatial
Awards for excellence in this field. My State and myself feel honoured that the
international jury has declared the State of Gujarat as the
Premier Geospatial State of India.
Friends ! India is growing very fast and is poised to become one of the three bi
ggest economies in the world. We are blessed with natural resources, a vibrant d
emocracy and a young and energetic population. At the same time, we are a countr
y ever hungry for faster development and we are also prone to disasters. Moreove
r, we live in a time when global warming and climate change threaten our future.
These factors impose strong conditions for utilisation of our resources for dev
elopment. Science and Technology, thus, has to play a very important role in bal
ancing the conflicting demands of development, disaster management and ecologica
l conservation.
We, in Gujarat, realised this fundamental requirement quite early. We, therefore
, made efforts to harness the modern technological developments to our benefit.
Gujarat is a unique State in terms of its location and diversity. It has one-thi
rd of India's coastline, the biggest wetland - the Rann of Kachch in the west, t
he Thar Desert to the north, the Aravalli Hills to the east and the Western Ghat
s in the south. Our unique geography and climate present us the opportunities an
d also pose the challenges in development process. We realised that the technolo
gies of Space Application could provide us the means to tackle these issues in a
coordinated and scientific manner. I feel proud at this moment that Gujarat's f
amous scientist, Dr Vikram Sarabhai, had the vision and leadership to develop th
is technology in India. These tools give us the capacity and strength for harves
ting our resources and using them efficiently. At the same time, they allow the
stakeholders to participate in the development process as informed and empowered
actors.
With this thought process, we set up a small centre called Remote Sensing and Co
mmunications Centre to harness the technologies of Remote Sensing and Space Comm
unications. Remote sensing gave us the ability to look at our resources in a hol
istic manner. Soon we realised that a centre was inadequate to handle the tasks
on hand. Therefore, we enlarged it to the present Bhaskaracharya Institute of Sp
ace Applications and Geoinformatics.
It is better known as BISAG. We have given BISAG a mandate to support the Govern
ment departments and institutions for their requirements of satellite communicat
ions and geospatial applications. BISAG is also supposed to simultaneously addre
ss the issues of capacity building. We are keen that we have on hand a large bod
y of well trained geospatial engineers and scientists.
Our end goal is very clear. We must make our state not only the premier state in
India, but a Global model; not only in terms of gross development but also in t
erms of Technological innovations. Our key stakeholders are our people who live
and work in Gujarat tilling its soil and working in its shops, offices and indus
tries. We need to make their quality of life better than earlier; rather better
than the best in the world. For this purpose, we had to reduce the wastages and
enhance productivity. We looked at different aspects and realised that all plann
ing, implementation and monitoring has a spatial component. These aspects could
be addressed with modern geospatial technologies. We also realised that these te
chnologies can be used more effectively in the context of modern development. Th
erefore, we adopted a holistic approach. We seamlessly integrated diverse data s
ets from different sources and used them to develop planning models and implemen
tation plans. We have also ensured that our agencies and institutions â own' these sy
stems .This has helped us to institutionalise such developments and innovations.
Today, in Gujarat, we are quite used to these applications. Even outside planne
rs and administrators are in search of Gujarat's Geo-spatial data whenever there
is a problem to be addressed.
Friends! Gujarat's model of Governance is defined by people's partnership in the
development process .We could also understand the power of modern communication
s to help us here. We are using satellite communications to interactively connec
t the people from the remotest corners of the state. We frequently communicate,
discuss our plans and monitor their progress involving the people .Thanks to the
technology of the space communications; we have rapidly converted our developme
nt into a participative process. As one of the earliest usages, we use the space
communications to help us in formal and non-formal education. We use this techn
ology as a â teacher in the sky'. This is basically to extend the benefit of top clas
s teachers to the backward institutions and remote areas. We are extensively usi
ng the EDUSAT programme to train our students from primary schools to engineerin
g and medical colleges. For us, this is a way of multiplying the benefits of a s
carce resource - good teachers.
Friends! We are now at a stage that we can share our achievements with others in
the National interest and in the interest of the Humanity. I am always fond of
saying that Gujarat's growth is for India's growth. You may be aware that recent
ly, we concluded the Vibrant Gujarat Global Summit. In this Summit, we hosted, a
mong others, thousands of delegates from more than hundred countries . We agreed
to and concluded MoUs worth Rs. 20.83 lakh croresâ which is around 450 billion US D
ollars. These MOUs are for various projects and activities relating to infrastru
cture, big, large and medium industries as well as knowledge sector including ca
pacity building. Looking back, however, I feel that we missed the luminaries of
the geospatial world at the Vibrant Gujarat Summit. In order to rectify this, it
is my pleasure to offer a location for India's first Geospatial Technology Park
in the Gujarat State.
We are a state with exemplary infrastructure, good work culture and an excellent
quality of life. Gujaratis are famous worldwide for their entrepreneurial skill
s. We are home to many global industries ranging from chemicals to heavy enginee
ring, and of course, Automobile. We would be happy to add geospatial technology
to this bouquet. I think such a Park would be the most appropriate addition cons
idering the adoption of this technology in our day to day work .It also looks be
fitting in view of the recognition you have given us today.
I invite you to Gujarat on both personal and institutional basis. Come and be a
part of our growth story.
Thank You!