For promoting girl education and bringing a change in rural lives, Smriti Irani, HRD Minister spoke out for an increased participation of DRDO's women scientists in the various initiatives taken by her ministry.
Accounting for 20 % of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) workforce, these women scientists can be source of inspiration for countless girls seeking opportunities to realise their dreams.
For the girls who want to excel in competitive exams of IITSs and IIMs, the DRDO can interact with them. Aiming at the girls coming from disadvantaged sections The Udaan initiative has been launched.
The Udaan enables them to join them and take leadership roles in the future focussing the issue of low enrolment ratio of girl students in prestigious educational institutions.
Commemorating International Women's Day Irani gave a speech on 'women innovators for excellence in research and science winners'
Addressing the issues that women in rural India confront, the minister said
that the women scientists of the premier research institute can contribute in the 'Unnat Bharat Abhiyan' as well.
The aim of the programme was to improve the rural India through technological interventions. The Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) and the National Institutes of Technology (NITs) across the country had taken charge of the programme last year.
Seeking the engagement of the DRDO scientists in the "'Rashtriya Avishkar Abhiyan" she said that another initiative of the Ministry is to inculcate interest in science and mathematics, as the inclination towards these subjects has decreased to about 30 per cent.