New Delhi:

The people of Jammu and Kashmir after living in a period of normalcy following the scrapping of special status to the erstwhile state feel encouraged to seek a true democracy, Union Minister Jitendra Singh told NDTV in an interview.

Referring to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s April 12 speech in Udhampur in the Union Territory about restoring statehood and holding a state election, Mr Singh said it is the Opposition’s false portrayal of the ground situation in the border state that is misleading people.

Udhampur, where voting was held on April 19, is Mr Singh’s Lok Sabha constituency.

“Elections had been happening for decades in Jammu and Kashmir, but with a very small voting percentage. It was a travesty of democracy that we had a voting percentage of just about 10 per cent. People would elect MPs and MLAs, particularly from Kashmir valley, and they would go on becoming MPs, MLAs, ministers, generations after generation,” the Union Minister of Science and Technology told NDTV.

“They have now cultivated a vested interest in the continuance of militancy. In the shadow of militancy and terrorism, they can have close elections with a limited voter turnout which would of course be managed by them, and then they would manage their victory, election after election,” Mr Singh said, in what was also seen as taking a swipe at dynastic politics.

The Abdullah family of the Jammu and Kashmir National Conference had been a strong political force in the region.

“Now that it (Jammu and Kashmir) has opened up, I think this is in the true spirit of democracy that we have a huge turnout, which also happened in the District Development Council (DDC) election,” Mr Singh said.

The DDC election was held after the centre in August 2019 scrapped special status to Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 of the Constitution.

“We had a huge voter turnout (DDC elections) even in Kashmir valley. The situation has dramatically turned for the better. The most evident proof of that is the fact that we had more than two crore tourists in Kashmir valley. No tourist would risk their family just by assurance handed out by the government, or by a travel agency unless they get information from their own sources,” Mr Singh said, adding that is what has encouraged and emboldened the common man on the streets of Kashmir valley to come out and aspire for true democracy.

The 2024 theme for National Science Day, which India celebrates every year on February 28, is “Science for Sustainable Development”.

Science and technological developments are key drivers of India’s journey towards becoming a developed country by 2047. India is committed to making this progress through sustainable means, as evidenced by its commitments under the Paris Agreement, participation in global fora for sustainable development, and reinforced in this year’s theme for Science Day. The role of science in driving sustainable development doesn’t need emphasis, but any conversation on science is incomplete without setting one key expectation: for science to transform India, it has to be sustainably and consistently funded.

How much is India spending on R&D?

Funding for fundamental research in India is amongst the world’s lowest, particularly for a country with high science and technology ambitions. In the recent past, India’s R&D expense has dropped to the current 0.64% of GDP from 0.8% in 2008-2009 and 0.7% in 2017-2018. This reduced expenditure is worrying considering government agencies themselves have issued several calls to double this spending.

The 2013 Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy noted that “Increasing Gross Expenditure on R&D (GERD) to 2% GDP has been a national goal for some time”. The 2017-2018 Economic Survey reiterated this in its chapter on science and technology transformation.

The reasons for the reduction in research and development (R&D) spending despite the government being cognisant of the need to increase it are not clear, but may stem from a lack of coordination between government agencies and a need for stronger political will to prioritise R&D expenses.

Most developed countries spend between 2% and 4% of their respective GDPs on R&D. In 2021, member-countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) on average spent 2.7% of GDP on R&D. The U.S. and the U.K. have consistently spent more than 2% of their GDPs on R&D for the past decade. So, many experts have called for India to spend at least 1%, but ideally 3%, of its GDP every year until 2047 on R&D for science to have a meaningful impact on development.

How can India improve its R&D spending?

Science requires consistent, large-scale investment to bear fruit. For India to reach ‘developed nation’ status, it needs to spend more to scale R&D than developed countries spend to maintain that status. This is the foundation of the demand to spend at least 3% of the GDP on R&D annually until 2047.

And beyond the current spending being inadequate, its primary dependence on public money signals an immature financing system and weak domestic market. In 2020-2021, private sector industry contributed 36.4% of the GERD whereas the Union government’s share was 43.7%. State governments (6.7%), higher education (8.8%), and public sector industry (4.4%) were the other major contributors.

In economically developed countries, a major share – 70% on average – of R&D investment comes from the private sector. The hesitancy of private-sector funding may be because of the poor capacity to evaluate R&D in India, ambiguous regulatory roadmaps that can deter investors, lack of clear exit options for investors in sectors such as biotechnology, and fears of intellectual property rights theft.

While the Anusandhan National Research Foundation was meant to solve some of the financial issues, its implementation has been delayed. The Rs-2,000-crore annual budget the government earmarked for its implementation in the last budget was revised to Rs 258 crores this year. Strategies for how the remaining budget of INR 7200 crore from the private sector is to be raised have also not been clarified yet.

Thus, there is a perceived need to determine the overall quantum of R&D funding and its primary sources, given India’s ambition to be a developed country by 2047.

How is the R&D budget utilised?

While the need for India to at least double its R&D investment has been expressed several times, the question of how effectively the allocated money is spent is explored less often. The Union Ministry of Science and Technology has consistently under-utilised its budget, so while the calls for increased funding – through both government and private sources – are legitimate, a strengthened budget utilisation is also required to affect science outcomes.

In 2022-2023,  the Department of Biotechnology (DBT), used only 72% of its estimated budget allocation on Centrally Sponsored Schemes/Projects while the Department of Science and Technology (DST) used only 61%. The Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR), which receives the lowest allocation for Centrally Sponsored Schemes, spent 69% of its allocation.

Such underutilisation is not a one-time error but has been consistently recorded over several years to varying degrees. The phenomenon is also not specific to the Science Ministry; given India generally under-spends on R&D, there will likely be a major impact if the allocated funds are spent optimally.

The reasons for under-utilisation, as with the under-allocation, are unclear and may indicate tedious bureaucratic processes for approving disbursements, lack of capacity to evaluate projects or clear utilisation certificates, lack of prioritisation for science funding by the Ministry of Finance or inadequate planning or implementation strategy for the requested funds by the Ministry of Science and Technology.

The lack of capacity also reflects in delays in grant and salary disbursements. Most of these issues can be fixed by proper capacity building within the different governmental agencies.

What does sustainable funding entail?

In the latest budget, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman provided many indications that the government would like R&D expenditure to include more contributions from the private sector. Against this backdrop, mitigating the under-spending and under-utilisation of funds earmarked for R&D stand out as obvious first steps. This in turn requires the political prioritisation of R&D spending and recognition of it as a core, irreplaceable element of India’s growth journey.

This prioritisation has to happen not only within the concerned Ministries but also at the Ministry of Finance, which disburses the funds. Incentives for private investment, including relaxation of foreign direct investments, tax rebates, and clear regulatory roadmaps for products will help build investor confidence.

Finally, India also needs the bureaucratic capacity to evaluate science projects and, after allocations, monitor utilisation. Building such capacity is a prerequisite for India becoming a science power by 2047. So this National Science Day, as we celebrate science for sustainable development, let’s also remember we need sustainable funding for science.

Shambhavi Naik is a researcher at The Takshashila Institution.

Union Minister of State for Science and Technology Jitendra Singh in Parliament on February 06, 2024.

The Centre on Monday said that provisions of the newly constituted research board, Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF), had come into effect and announced the appointment of Abhay Karandikar, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology (DST), as interim CEO of the body on Tuesday.

The ANRF aims to be a research funding organisation that will have a corpus of ₹50,000 crore at the outset with nearly ₹36,000 crore projected to come from the private sector. The aim of this new funding body is to “…provide high level strategic direction for research, innovation and entrepreneurship in the fields of natural sciences including mathematical sciences, engineering and technology, environmental and earth sciences, health and agriculture, and scientific and technological interfaces of humanities and social sciences…”

The DST in a press statement on Tuesday said that “…provisions of the ANRF Act had been brought into force on February 5, 2024”.  Earlier this week, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman provisioned ₹2,000 crore towards the ANRF for the financial year 2024-25.

The ANRF Act was passed by both Houses of Parliament in 2023. However, the ‘rules’ accompanying the text of the Act are yet to be made public. Mr. Karandikar told The Hindu that the rules had been “notified” and would be done “30 days after public notification”.

“The ANRF act coming into force is a heartening piece of news for scientists, researchers, innovators and startups. For the first time after Independence, under the leadership of the Honourable PM Shri Narendra Modi, India now has a National Research Foundation called Anusandhan”, said, Mr. Jitendra Singh, Science Minister, posted on X on Tuesday.

The Department of Science and Technology (DST) would be the administrative department of NRF and led by a Governing Board consisting of eminent researchers and professionals across disciplines. The Prime Minister will be the ex-officio President of the Board and the Union Minister of Science & Technology & Union Minister of Education will be the ex-officio Vice-Presidents. NRF’s functioning will be governed by an Executive Council chaired by the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India.

The ANRF subsumes the existing Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), established in 2008, and in many respects identical to the ANRF. The rationale is that the ANRF had an “…expanded mandate and covers activities over and above the activities of SERB,” the press statement added.

New Delhi:

The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will carry out the first of several test flights ahead of the Gaganyaan mission on October 21, Science and Technology Minister Jitendra Singh said on Tuesday.

The test vehicle development flight (TV-D1) will be conducted at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh to test the crew module that is scheduled to house Indian astronauts during the human spaceflight late next year.

The test involves launching the module to outer space, bringing it back to earth and recovering it after touchdown in the Bay of Bengal. The Navy has already started mock operations to recover the module, Singh said at a felicitation programme of the ISRO engineers involved in the Chandrayaan-3 and Aditya L-1 missions.

Along with the crew module, the TV-D1 will also test the “crew escape” system that is expected to bring back the crew to earth if the spacecraft faces a problem while ascending into space.

The success of the test will set the stage for the first unmanned “Gaganyaan” mission and ultimately, manned mission to outer space in a low-earth orbit, the minister said.

Before the ultimate manned “Gaganyaan” mission, there will be a test flight next year, which will carry “Vyommitra”, a female robot astronaut, he added.

The Gaganyaan project envisages a demonstration of the human spaceflight capability by launching a human crew to an orbit of 400 km and bringing them safely back to earth by landing in Indian sea waters

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Udhampur, Jammu And Kashmir:

Union Minister of State for Science and Technology Jitendra Singh said that the world is praising India for “taking the leadership role” and not following anyone’s footsteps.

“Today the world is praising India for taking the leadership role. The time has ended when India was expected to follow what other nations do,” Jitendra Singh told ANI Sunday.

Lauding Prime Minister Narendra Modi for leading India on the path of development, Jitendra Singh said, “People of the country understood that PM Modi has walked the talk and led India to the path of development. The Amrit Kal program today will set the tone for the next 25 years.”

On India’s achievements in the space sector, the Minister said, “We had no dearth of talent, of capability in our country. Our citizens, our scientists had the talent and the dream. We started our space program from the time we had less resources at our disposal. Vikram Sarabhai used to take things on his cycle since he had no car.”

Jitendra Singh also batted for the entry of private players in India’s space program, “After PM Modi came, private players came into being and industry was allowed to participate. During the launch of Aditya-1, we saw that though ISRO executed the mission several organisations across the country helped in making the mission successful, whether in manufacturing or technology.”

Earlier in the day, Jitendra Singh launched the ‘Meri Maati Mera Desh’ campaign at Tikri-1B Panchayat here, which is part of Amrit Kalash Yatras all over the country.

The Amrit Kalash Yatras include the collection of soil and rice from every household symbolising the participation of the people in the prosperity of the motherland.

During the inauguration, Jitendra Singh said that India’s recent space marvels have only been possible under PM Narendra Modi who has opened up new vistas for India’s space sector through the public-private partnership model and now the ‘sky is not the limit’ dictum has become true for India’s space sector.

The last nine years have witnessed a quantum jump in India’s space journey, making India standing at par with NASA, and Roscosmos, among others, which are now collaborating with ISRO for space expeditions, Jitendra Singh added.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)