Delivering the keynote address on the occasion, Director, governing body of the Reserve Bank of India and former PAU vice-chancellor Dr S.S. Johl, said the country's economy would improve with the entry of MNCs, which would also help provide competition to the local industry, which was not there amongst the Swadesh companies in the country, when the concept remained tilted in favour of a few hand-picked industrialists and business houses.

Among others who spoke on the occasion included Punjab's minister of State Swarna Ram, president of Shri Siddhivinayak Shikshan Sanstha, Govindrao Sugrao Pawar, Dr R.S. Gill, Dr Dinesh Prakash, B.C. Samariya, Kiran Chaudhary and others.

Meanwhile, the Society also presented awards to fifteen outstanding men and women from different walks of life for the prestigious "Gem of industries", "Didaya Rattan Puraskar" and "Vishisht Chikitsak Puraskar".

While D.S. Kadam of Shikshan Prasarak Mandal, Mangalwedha was presented the Vidya Visharad Puraskar, Govindrao Sugao Pawar of Siddhivinayak Shikshan Sanstha, Amrik Singh of Punjab State Cooperative Milk Producer Federation and Jayasinh Shankarrao Patil of Shikshan Prasarak Mandal were presented the Vidya Ratan Puraskar.

The "Gem of Industries" award was awarded to Bhagwandas Chetram Samariya of Shree Samariya Textiles and Madansinh Shankarrao Patil of Shankarrao Mohite Sahakari Soot Girni,, while the Vishisht Chikitsak Puraskar awards went to O.P. Arora of Arora Neuro Centre, Sumita Sofat of Sofat Diagnostic and P.N. Gupta of P.N. Urology Centre.

The Shreshth Utpadakta Puraskar were awarded to Kawaljit Singh Wali of Commando Caterers, R.S. Gill of Rajasthan Coop Dairy Federation, Kuldeep Singh Bhattal of Hira Automobiles, G.S. Chavan of Sahyadri Sahakari Sakhar Karkhana, Deepak Kanagaonkar of Phoenix Alchemy, D.D. Sharma, J.R. Mahajn of Em Cee Cee Sports and Pradeep Kumar Jain of Parsvnath Developers.