Modi moots for 'Solar' Group of countries

Ahmedabad, Nov 11: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi today said the countries that have surplus solar energy, should form a group and have a corpus fund to deal with energy crisis.

''This group which will mostly comprise of developing countries, can work together to save humanity from an energy crisis,'' he said while addressing a gathering at the inaugural session of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL) here.

In a lighter vein, he said,''Poets and scientists alike are all after the moon and seems everybody is running away from the sun, which is a major source of energy.'' President A P J Abdul Kalam who inaugurated the session, welcomed his suggestion and said the PRL should take it up as a challenge and work on a solar cell.

He said increasing the solar photovoltaic cell efficiency from the existing 15 per cent to 45 per cent using silicon as a base with Carbon Nano Tube is an important research challenge.

Mr Modi also said Gujarat has a 1600-km long coastline that should be effectively used and called upon scientists to come up with solutions for quakes and tsunamis as the state lies on seismic zone 5.

He also lamented that today's generation was more oriented towards IT, medicine and other career options than pure sciences. He said if a survey is conducted among 100 students, hardly one or two would talk of science as a career.

''Scientists are like 'rishis' (sages) who are into 'sadhna' (penace). There's no glamour, no media publicity in science and therefore the youth today are opting more for IT.'' ''Thankfully, President Kalam is a scientist and we can hope that more and more people will emulate him and take to science,'' he added.

UNI