A very warm welcome and Good morning to all the dignitaries on dice, faculty, staff and my dear friends,

today we all gathered here to celebrate 44th engineers day. In India, this day is celebrated by engineering fraternity on 15th of September, every year. The date was selected because it is the birthday of legendary engineer Dr. Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya (M. Visvesvaraya). It was this day 152 years ago that this great contributor to growth and engineering was born. He is known to be the greatest engineers of all times, who with his vision and dedication in the field of engineering made some exceptional contributions to India. Owing to his contribution he was honored with the highest state award of India, the The Bharat Ratna, in the year 1955. He was internationally recognized for his genius in harnessing water resources, successful design and construction of several river dams, bridges and implementing irrigation and drinking water schemes all over India. Each letter in the word Engineer has its own meaning i.e. E- eager, N nonstop learning, G - genius, I Intelligent, N Nations Builder, E effort maker, E excellence, R- rider. A famous quote says, Engineering is the professional art of applying science to the optimum conversion of natural resources to the benefit of man This quote conform the influencing role of engineers in the development of nation. Engineers are those who operate at interface between science and society. Engineers are the backbone of development & technology. Today, India has important vision and mission in the areas of space research, defense development, rural development, renewable energies, agriculture and food processing, information and communication technology, education etc. and for this there is need of engineers with vision, passion to transform the vision into action, courage to think different, to combat problems. According to India Vision 2020 for transforming nation into developed country of honorable former president of India Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, not only engineers but everyone should have the ambition to live in a developed country, and for this each one of us show that integrity towards the development of nation. Finally I would like to remind you an old saying that engineers rule the world and we all are now on the way to become an engineer, so we should make a promise to our self that we use our intelligence, knowledge for the welfare of the society and mankind. Thank you very much.