Memorandum submitted by the University
of Cambridge
Sincere thanks for your letter following the
dinner at Trinity College on 5 December. As promised, I now write
to update and report back to you on my visit. Please feel free
to share with the Select Committee any or all of this.
I am an optimist by nature but even I would
not have predicted the warmth of the welcome we received from
academic colleagues, alumni and friends across India. It was truly
an affirmation of the long-standing bonds between India and the
University of Cambridge.
The purpose of our visit to New Delhi, Bangalore,
Kolkata and Mumbai was to increase the visibility of Cambridge's
many links with India to give formal recognition to some of our
existing collaborations, and to explore and build new partnerships
in both the academic and the industry sectors. It also gave me
the opportunity to meet with many Cambridge alumni from all four
cities and beyond.
In Delhi, I had the privilege to attend a private
lunch at the Prime Minister's Residence where I was able to thank
the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, in person for the generous
gift of the Indian Government which has established the Jawaharlal
Nehru Professorship in Indian Business and Enterprise and Judge
Business School. The announcement was widely covered by the Indian
media, but the continuing press coverage throughout the visit
was particularly pleasing. I enclose a selection of this coverage
for your information.
We produced a booklet to accompany the visit,
a second copy of which I have pleasure in enclosing (not printed
here), which identifies some 50 academic partnerships between
Cambridge and India. While it gives a flavour of the breadth and
depth of Cambridge's interactions with India, it is by no means
exhaustive. I also enclose a copy of a summary report that we
produced for Prime Minister Gordon Brown ahead of his visit to
India later in January (not printed here).
I was joined at various stages of the trip by
more than 20 senior academics, all of whom have significant existing
relationships in India. Many of these colleagues ran and participated
in joint workshops in areas of social and development economics,
nanoscience, structural biology, stem cell biology, product design
and innovation and entrepreneurship.
Looking ahead, it is fundamentally important
that Cambridge's relationships with India should be real partnerships,
characterized by exchange rather than a one-way flow, and I am
pleased to report that we signed five MOUS with academic institutions
and industry, primarily to encourage Cambridge students and academics
to spend time in India. It is my strong hope that Cambridge will
continue to attract some of the best and brightest minds from
India to study at Cambridge both at undergraduate and postgraduate
level.
This is all very much a work of progress. I
was inspired by the experience we had, by the close relationships
between collaborating academics in Cambridge and India, and by
the opportunities to do more together. I was moved by the enthusiasm
of Cambridge alumni wherever we went and excited by the possibility
of working more closely with industrialists, entrepreneurs, and
India's emerging innovation ecosystems.
All this has already led me to a firm decision
to return to India in a year's time, and many of my colleagues
will be making regular visits over the coming months. I also hope
that over then next few months I will be able to seek your advice
and support, and indeed to meet and share with many of you some
of my experience as we move forward together.
22 January 2008
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