UPA govt readies new science policy
Eight years after the NDA government came out with India’s first science and technology policy, the Congress-led UPA government is planning to throw the earlier policy out of the window and come out with its own S&T policy with a clear cut focus on innovation.
The new policy aims to promote an “innovation eco-system for inclusive and sustainable growth” and bring the private and public sector industries under an umbrella for delivering “measurable economic and social outcomes.”
“Innovation becomes important if India is to catch up with the world and find its right position. That will be the focus of the new policy,” T Ramasami, Secretary to the Department of Science and Technology told Deccan Herald.
The first hint of the proposed policy came from the Union Science Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh who, at the 99th session of the Indian Science Congress, stated that the policy would be dedicated to the nation soon.
Ramasami, however, clarified that the draft policy would be first put up on the website within a “quick time” and would only be adopted only after wide consultation. Lack of consultation among scientists and the public was one of the main criticisms for the 2003 policy, which was announced by then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in the 90th session of the Indian Science Congress in Bangalore in 2003.
The new Science, Technology and Innovation policy may be released by the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the centenary celebration of the Indian Science Congress in Kolkata in 2013.
In the half century since Independence, India had two policy documents on science and technology – the Scientific Policy Resolution of 1958 and the Technology Policy Statement of 1983. Both enunciated the principles on which the growth of science and technology in India has been based over the past several decades with a clear-cut emphasis on self-reliance and also sustainable and equitable development.
