Only 1/5th of applications from 2009-19 granted patents

Indian research and technology institutes filed over 25,000 patent applications from 2009 to 2019, but only one-fifth of those were approved, the government informed Parliament on Tuesday.

In a written response to a question in the Rajya Sabha, Science and Technology Minister Harsh Vardhan said from 2009 to 2019 (up till November 24), 25,200 patent applications were filed by different institutes in the country.

The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) filed 2,413 patent applications in the said period, the minister said, adding that 3,751 applications were filed by the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs), 2,016 by the National Institutes of Technology (NITs) and 998 by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

He added that of the 25,200 applications, patents were granted in 5,089 cases. Of those, a major chunk went to the CSIR (1,917), followed by the IITs (519), the DRDO (519) and the NITs (11).

Several universities, including G B Pant University (14) and Anna University (13), were also granted patents in this period, the minister said.