DHAKA  – Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina today said laid importance on creating competent manpower to sustain in the tough global race.

“The world is progressing fast and Bangladesh has to keep pace with the race. So we want to build up our children in that way and education is the main key to win the race,” she said.

The prime minister said while distributing award among this year’s 12 best talent students selected under the program title- Srijanshil Medha Onneshon (Creative Talent Hunt).

Sheikh Hasina said the education is the prime component to make the country free from hunger and poverty and running the country in future. A person can survive in any way if he/she has education, she said.

Bangladesh needs many competent workforces to operate the satellite, nuclear power plant and other sophisticated technology, she added.

Congratulating the talented students the prime minister said education is the best wealth for a human being. And she and her sister Sheikh Rehana taught it to their children.

Sheikh Hasina said children of Bangladesh are really talented and they can flourish themselves if they get minimum scope. So, it’s important to find out them through searching and give recognition.

In view of this, the government has undertaken the Medha Onneshon programme, she said adding that the government has attached importance to science and technical education along with modernization of the Madrasa
education.

The prime minister said the government is giving scholarship to the meritorious students to help them continue studies. Free textbooks are being given to school students to lessen burden of the guardians, she said.

Education Minister Nurul Islam Nahid presided over the function while State Minister for Technical and Madrasa education department Kazi Keramat Ali was present as special guest.

Secretary for Secondary and High Education of Education Ministry Sohrab Hossain gave welcome address while Mahin Muntasir and Siratul Mustakim Srabonti spoke on behalf of the best talent students.

The government has launched the Srijanshil Medha Onneshon Competition in 2013 to select the distinctive talent students of general intellectual and inventive property in the country through a nationwide search.

The competition is held on in three groups for four subjects-Literature, Science, Mathematics and Computer. The groups are constituted with the students of Class-VI to VIII, students of Class IX and X and students of XI and XII. Each of the 12 talent students was given a trophy, scholarship of Taka one lakh and a certificate.

The prime minister also awarded medal, Taka 5,000 and a certificate to 108 the talent students of four subjects in the three groups at divisional level.

The prime minister said Bangladesh was liberated to be a hunger and poverty free nation as most of its people was poverty stricken and had no access to education, healthcare and shelter.

She said Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman fought for 23 years for liberating the country, but he got only three and a half years time to materialize his dream.

Bangabandhu had given top priority to education, making the primary education compulsory and complimentary for the nation, she said.

Sheikh Hasina said her government believes in the policy of Bangabandhu and is making constant stride to build an educated nation by ensuring access to education to every citizen.

The prime minister said post-1975 governments brandished the meritorious students with arms and used them as political weapons. Those rulers had no attention to build the students as the human resources, she said.

Sheikh Hasina said the Awami League after coming to power in 1996 after 21 years conducted a survey to assess the requirement of schools, colleges and other education institutions in different parts of the country along with
an initiative to make the country illiteracy free.

During the five year tenure of Awami League, she said the literacy rate rose to 65 percent. But literacy rate declined to 44 percent during the five year regime of BNP-Jammat, she said.

Pointing out the launching of Bangabandhu Satellite the prime minister said her government wants to build a science and technology based nation.
Bangabandhu Satellite would bring the whole country under internet network
and promote digital education.

Sheikh Hasina urged the students to read the books on life and works of Bangabandhu to know about the country’s history.