“Experience America” event
The image of India has been transformed, literally, acquiring a new ‘face’ in the last 20 years. Instead of an abstraction, India now has a visible and tangible presence in the United States, through the 1.5 million-strong Indian-American community, G. Thiruvasagam, Vice-Chancellor, Bharathiar University, said here on Monday.Inaugurating “Experience America,” a three-day event organised by the U.S. Consulate General, Chennai, and the GRD College of Science, to commemorate 60 years of Indo-U.S. friendship, he said that the influence of the Indian-American community on American images of India and the Indian images of the U.S. had generally been positive and was likely to have an enduring impact on the bilateral relationship.“Sixty years of friendship and mutual co-operation between the two democratic countries are matters of pride and joy for the citizens of both the countries,” Dr. Thiruvasagam said.He, however, he expressed the concern over the American practice of linking human rights’ issues with economic policies, the question of child labour, disappearance of Indian brands and danger of a political backlash from uneven economic growth within India.He was happy that both the countries were more actively engaged in a wide range of issues, mainly educational partnerships. “Students are clamouring for greater access to higher educational institutions in the U.S. Our goal is to build on the tradition of Indian and American students studying side-by-side. We believe that education and exchange programmes are natural bridges and the best thing about them is that one can cross them both ways.”
India and the United States had been building a constructive cooperation over an ever widening range of issues and areas – economic, political, cultural and human interactions.This happy and promising evolution, so steadily sought by well wishers on both sides, was seen as the realisation of one of the major features of the new century, the Vice-Chancellor said.Wesley Robertson, Information Officer, U.S. Consulate General, Chennai, and D. Padmanabhan, Chairman, GRD Institutions, spoke.
