Three Israeli centres of excellence in State

In another fillip to Israel’s deepening engagement with Karnataka, the country on Tuesday said that it would start three centres of excellence in the State.

In an interaction with mediapersons, Israeli Ambassador to India Alon Ushpiz said 30 centres of excellence were planned across India.

“In Karnataka, we will start excellence centres in Belgaum, Bagalkot and Kolar. They will be hubs of research and development centres for vegetables, pomegranate and mango,” Ushpiz said.

Talking about visa services, he said the consulate in Bangalore would facilitate speedy clearance of visas.

“Even though it will be done in Bangalore, a few visa cases will be handled in Mumbai.
Israel received 40,000-45,000 visitors from India which includes tourists, pilgrims and scholars,” Ushpiz added.

Discussions on

On the R&D tie-up with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), he said discussions were on.

“We are already giving 70 post-doctoral research opportunity for Indian students. We are open for any tie-up with the IISc but I can’t assure anything at this point in time,” he said. A team from Israeli consulate is scheduled to visit the mango development centre  at Hogalagere  in Kolar district on May 15.