Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said the country’s universities and institutions of higher education should place the same emphasis on innovation as they do on imparting knowledge, reported PTI.

“Innovation is very important because without it, life seems like a burden,” said Modi. “In our ancient universities like Takshshila, Nalanda and Vikramashila, innovation was given emphasis along with knowledge.”

“I insist that students should give knowledge in classrooms of college, university but they also add them to the aspirations of the country,” Modi said at an event organised by the Ministry of Human Resource Development in New Delhi.

Calling for “wholesome” education in the country, Modi stressed on the importance of character-building over literacy, citing the examples of BR Ambedkar, Deendayal Upadhyay, Ram Manohar Lohiya and Swami Vivekananda.

“Knowledge and education are not restricted to books,” he said. “The purpose of education is to enable balanced growth of every dimension of a human being, which is not possible without innovation.”

“Interlinking” of institutions is also vital in order to help students connect their classroom learning to the aspirations of the country, said Modi. “Our universities and colleges should be leveraged to find solutions to the challenges facing us,” he said. “We should interlink institutions to innovate and incubate.”

Modi also urged students to take responsibility for spreading digital literacy and generating awareness of government schemes that can improve the ease of living.