Utilising technology to help the country’s huge rural population will be the central theme of the 93rd Indian Science Congress to be inaugurated by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in Hyderabad on Tuesday.
More than 5,000 scientists, including three Nobel laureates, will be attending the five-day annual gathering of India’s top scientists, which is being hosted by the capital of Andhra Pradesh for the second time.
Amartya Sen, the world’s best known welfare economist, will take over from the Prime Minister to pin the event’s focus on lifting the living standards of the rural poor, with a special address at the Acharya N G Ranga Agricultural University, the second educational institution in Hyderabad to host the science congress after the Osmania University did it in 1998. Joining Prof.
Sen in the brainstorming session during the congress will be Kenyan environmentalist and human rights activist Wangari Mathai, the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. President APJ Abdul Kalam will be in Hyderabad on Thursday to kick off the National Virtual Congress of farmers.
