Speed Post News Network
New Delhi : The Department of Science and Technology (DST) has undergone tremendous change in recent times evolving into an architect of profound science as against incremental science and the Coronavirus crisis is an opportunity to escalate the process, Professor Ashutosh Sharma, Secretary, DST, said in a live webinar conversation with Elets Technomedia on ‘Fighting Corona – Leveraging Scientific Research & Innovation’ on the occasion of its 50thFoundation Day.
“We are now designing programmes in such way that scientists can take risks in doing their science and produce results that would be impactful and can bring about change. Some of these programmes are the Scientific and Useful Profound Research and Advancement (SUPRA) and Intensification of Research in High Priority Areas (IRHPA). Such programmes are changing the way that science is done. The concept and approach of some of these have been adopted in our efforts to find solutions to the COVID 19 crisis rapidly,” Sharma said.
Professor Sharma pointed out that some of the DST autonomous organisations have come up with several solutions for different aspects of the multidimensional COVID pandemic within a month and some of them have emerged in collaboration with private companies and startups. Elaborating further, he said that DST whose foundation was laid on May 3, 1971, along the model of National Science Foundation(NSF), USA, not only provides funding but also makes policies and co-ordinates scientific work with other countries, and is a great platform for empowering scientists and scientific institutions.
Talking about the key initiatives undertaken by DST during the last five years, Prof. Ashutosh Sharma mentioned DST’s budget has increased over 100%, which has allowed initiation of new programmes in a wide range of areas. He spoke about NIDHI, an end to end plan for startups which has enabled doubling of the number of incubators and startups in the last five years, MANAK which triggers innovations from annually 10 lakh school children throughout the country to convert their ideas into prototypes, preparing the children for challenges of future like innovation and entrepreneurship and helping them harness the power of their ideas.
Professor Sharma spoke about the SATHI centres housing equipment dedicated to the needs of MSMEs and startups for rapid prototyping developed at the cost of Rs 125 crore each to connect industry with academia.
Prof. Sharma stressed that DST is helping the country to be future-ready with programmes in new and emerging areas like the Cyber-Physical systems– an interdisciplinary programme converging areas like communication, computing, arts and so on, National Mission on Quantum Science, Science Technology and its Applications, Supercomputing Mission as well as by working on challenging areas like Sustainable Development, Rise of Intelligent Machines and Climate change research and the COVID 19 crisis has tested its strength of the readiness for the future, according to a PIB release.