supported your alma mater and contributed to your education kovind saidthe president lauded the academic performance of graduating woman studentsgoing through the list of the 152 students who are graduating today by getting undergraduate and masters degrees or phds i find that 66 are girl students that is a little over 40 per centhowever both the gold medals for academic performance have gone to girl students three of the four awards for academic excellence have been won by girl students kovind saidit is my privilege to travel to convocations across the country i find this commendable performance of our young women of our societys daughters to be something of a national trend they are consistently outscoring their male counterparts this is a step forward in the cause of gender equity and in making india a developed society he saidnoting that iiser is one of indias foremost destinations for students interested in science kovind said the institute is well on its way to fulfilling its mandate of promoting and providing facilities for basic science research and integrating these with the needs of indiathis is one of the most exciting and promising urban agglomerations in our country in parallel iiser mohali is also drawing inspiration from the rich tradition of basic and applied scientific research in punjab this legacy goes back to the period before independence when punjab was one of indias earliest centres of scientific knowledge production and training he saidthis legacy also provides us some excellent examples of how collaboration between scientific researchers and technologists on one side and the larger developmental process on the other contributed to nation building kovind saidwe cant forget the technologists who did the groundwork for large projects such as the bhakra nangal project it was agricultural scientists and universities in punjab that provided the basis for enhanced food productivity and the green revolutiontoday mohali is a hub for the knowledge economy information technology biotechnology and bioinformatics and related fields it is critical that we see iiser as not just a standalone institution but as the fulcrum of an entire ecosystem he saidon the occasion the governors of punjab and haryana were also present