Afghanistan president Hamid Karzai who was at the Symbiosis International University for a seminar on international relations recalled his days as a student in a boarding school in Shimla.
While interacting with students from various countries including his own nation, Karzai said, “India is not a melting pot which will assimilate you in their culture. Instead it will inculcate values and morals in you.”
Before interacting with students, Karzai attended the International Relations Conference on India and Development Partnerships in Asia and Africa at Symbiosis International University campus in Lavale.
“There are thousands of students who are studying in India in fields like management, medical, computer science and engineering and India is facilitating several scholarships to them.”
Well-versed in Hindi songs
Before Karzai’s speech, students from various Asian countries of the institute presented a dance programme showcasing the culture of their respective countries and in the last performance, some Indian students performed on the popular Hindi number, ‘Aaj kal tere mere pyar ke charche har zuban par.’
Karzai started his speech with the same song, and said that the song related to the love relation between India and Afghanistan. He went further and sang the iconic ‘Pyar kiya to darna kya.’
On student life
While recalling his memories as a student in Himachal Pradesh University in Shimla, he said that he used to live in a small room near the construction site and how he coped up with the food and the culture.
Karzai came to India as a student when he was 18. He graduated from Sanatan Dharma Bhargva College and pursued his Masters in Political Science from the Himachal Pradesh University in 1983.
On trade & commerce
While answering a question from a student on Afghanistan’s strategies after 2014 when the NATO forces would be going back from the nation, he said that India has been playing a pivotal role in the construction of Afghanistan and after 2014, the ties between the two countries will continue and India will be extending support in exchanging trade, education and culture.
Karzai said that if India wants to use Centre Asia as a potential market for their product, they have to go to these countries through Afghanistan and this will help both the countries to strengthen the trade ties.
“Our nation is full of minerals and natural resources and India will be the first beneficiary of the business opportunities to use these deposits,” he said.
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