Gandhinagar, Jan 22 (IANS) Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated a three-day international symposium on advances in earthquake sciences here Saturday.

Speaking at the function at the Institute of Seismological Research (ISR) campus, Modi said the state had focussed on minimising the risk from such natural calamities, including setting up the ISR.

‘Today, we are able to monitor not only every part of Gujarat but seismic fallouts elsewhere as well. We were able to monitor the one in Quetta as well,’ Modi said Saturday, four days before the tenth anniversary of the 2001 Gujarat earthquake.

The chief minister invited students from all over the world to utilize seismic research facilities created at ISR with the assistance provided by the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank.

‘Students who would like to carry out studies on the resurrection of Kutch post earthquake towards their doctoral thesis will get all support and scholarship for two years,’ he said.

Set up by the science and technology department of the Gujarat government, the ISR is functioning since 2006. It shifted to its sprawling 15-acre campus in 2008.

Dr. B.K. Rastogi, the director general of the institute, said the seminar was being attended by key figures involved in seismic studies and research from around the world.