Sir,
The politicised 21-million dollar United States Agency for International Development (USAID) allocated to India to influence voter turnout has created an impression among the common man that USAID is evil funding and harming the nation.
This perception is rampant among most millennials, who are ignorant of our past. Their knowledge is driven by WhatsApp messages and social media.
The USAID began in 1951 with President Harry S. Truman (April 12, 1945 to Jan. 20, 1953) when India badly needed food aid. Over decades, USAID’s role has been supporting infrastructure development, capacity building, economic reforms, higher education and research.
The IIT Kanpur was built with aid from the US and other IITs with assistance from different countries — like IIT Bombay from the Soviet Union, IIT Madras from Germany and IIT Delhi from the UK.
My Department (Geology) at Manasagangothri and I were beneficiaries of the 12-million dollar USAID programme in the 1960s meant for buying advanced research equipment.
The Department of Geology established a Mineralogical Institute to start high-pressure temperature research for the first time in the country.
This was the vision of Prof. Jagapathi Naidu and Prof. Viswanathaiah. I was the first Research Assistant and there was no idea where to start without equipment.
At that time, the Central Government had notified USAID to help Indian institutions to import equipment from the US. I jumped at the opportunity to propose a high-pressure temperature research system with four reactors from Tempres, USA.
Thus, USAID triggered our research for decades and placed us on an international platform.
My intent in this letter is not to get into the politics of recent controversy but to educate the new generation about the enormous benefits of USAID to our development and programmes.
— Prof. Jalees Ahmed Khan Tareen (J.A.K. Tareen), Padma Shri, former Vice-Chancellor of Kashmir University, Pondicherry University and UGC Member., Mysuru, 22.2.2025
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This post was published on March 1, 2025 6:00 pm