Badawi explores links with science institute

Friday, 24 December 2004, 20:30 IST
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BANGALORE: Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi Thursday expressed keen interest in establishing academic and research ties with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), the country's premier scientific and technology institute. On the concluding day of his five-day trip to India, Badawi visited the sprawling IISc campus here with his delegation for a first hand glimpse of the academic and research activities conducted at the facility set up by Jamshedji Tata in 1910. IISc director Govardhan Mehta told IANS Badawi was on an exploratory visit for forging academic and research collaborations between the institute and its counterparts in Malaysia. "He showed keen interest in initiating joint projects in bio-informatics, biodiversity and atmospheric sciences with Malaysian academic and research institutes," Mehta said. "We made a presentation on various activities of the institute and explained the possible areas of cooperation between IISc and similar institutes in Malaysia." During his two-hour tour of the campus, Badawi was taken around the Supercomputer Education and Research Centre (SERC) to demonstrate its role in hi-tech areas of science and technology projects. "We exchanged ideas and explored commonality of interests for establishing academic links between IISc and Malaysian institutes," Mehta said. Earlier in the day, Badawi visited Infosys Technologies and Bicon Ltd in the Electronics City on the outskirts of Bangalore for a glimpse of technological strides taken by the country's leading IT and biotech majors. Infosys chairman N.R. Narayana Murthy and CEO Nandan M. Nilekani briefed Badawi on the company's software development activities and explained its global delivery model. At Biocon, Badawi went around its human insulin plant and showed great interest in the manufacturing process of biotech products. Impressed by the production and research facilities of Biocon, Badawi said he looked forward to joint collaborations between Malaysian and Indian biotech firms to enhance economic cooperation between the two countries. Biocon chairperson Kiran Mazumdar Shaw briefed Badawi on the biotechnology sector in India. Bicon has a few marketing tie-ups in Malaysia. After his two-day visit to Bangalore, Badawi left for Turkey Thursday night.
Source: IANS