The Lok Sabha on Monday passed the Anusandhan National Research Foundation Bill, that proposes to establish the National Research Foundation (NRF). The new body aims to direct research, innovation and entrepreneurship in “strategic” areas, ranging from science to humanities and involve the private sector, which currently contributes only around 36% to research and development expenditure, in a bigger way.
The NRF replaces the Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), established in 2008, and will be presided over by the Prime Minister of India and the minister of science and education as ‘vice presidents.’ There is also an explicit inclusion of five members from business and industry, who can be nominated to the Board by the Prime Minister. The rest of the structure of the NRF, in having an executive council to manage day-to-day affairs are essentially like that of the SERB. The NRF will be “administratively” managed by the Department of Science and Technology.
“The Bill will facilitate investments by the private sector in research. This can be from companies, international organisations, philanthropies etc. If we have to progress as a society then we need to remove the barriers that exist between private and public (sector),” Minister of State, Science and Technology, Jitendra Singh said while discussing the Bill.
Following his remarks, only a handful of parliamentarians discussed the Bill with nearly all, save one, from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. There was no discussion on clauses of the Bill, with the discussion centred around India’s growing stature in the world of science and research and how India, unlike a few decades ago, when it trailed the West, was now “at par” in terms of basic research in areas such as quantum computing.
Mr. Singh added that the NRF’s ambition of getting at least ₹36,000 crore from non-government sources, in the next five years, of the foundation’s projected ₹50,000 crore outlay, would be “easily achieved.”
