Bhubaneswar, Sep 12 (IANS): Union Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Zubin Irani on Saturday advised students to choose and pursue their life's journey by being more innovative after attaining their degrees at the various IITs of the country.

Addressing the fourth convocation of IIT-Bhubaneswar at its Argul campus here in Odisha, Irani stressed on enhancing the innovative skills of students pursuing higher technical and professional studies in the IITs of the country.

She exhorted the students to make good use of "Start Up India Initiative" launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The minister said that youth possessing excellent technical and professional backup from IITs could display their talents in Start Up India initiatives.

Encouraging technical students to undertake new ventures with innovative programmes, she said the students could choose their own path with a little bit of imagination.

Irani said the MUDRA Yojana launched by the prime minister would provide easy financial assistance to small businesses which can then be expanded and create more job opportunities.

The HRD minister conferred the President of India's gold medal to Sushant Sachan, a B.Tech mechanical engineering student at IIT-Bhubaneswar during the convocation.

She also handed over the Director's Gold Medal to Pratik Nayak, a M.Tech civil engineering student and Anudeep Nain, a student of mathematics at the institute.