Dr. Akhilesh Gupta, Secy SERB interacts with IUST faculty

Awantipora: Dr. Akhilesh Gupta, Secretary, Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB) and Senior Advisor to GoI, Policy Coordination & Programme Management Division, Department of Science and Technology, Govt. of India interacted with faculty and research scholars of the Islamic University of Science and Technology (IUST) on Science, Technology, and Innovation policy (STIP) and discussed the key features, priorities and strategies of the STIP.
According to a statement issued from Public Relations Office, Islamic University of Science and Technology here, he provided a detailed overview of the research and development landscape of the country and the path envisioned under STIP for making a significant progress in promoting innovations and start-ups in the country. He said that the STIP formulation was the outcome of bottom-up, decentralised and inclusive exercise based on widespread stakeholder participation from scientists, women and even Indian diaspora. During his presentation, he highlighted the key recommendations of the policy such as doubling fulltime equivalent researchers in next 5-7 years, increased participation of private sector and businesses in promoting R&D and innovations, promoting grassroots innovations, and participation of state government in promoting an ecosystem of innovations, achieving equity and inclusion among others. He outlined the initiatives of the government since the last 10 years in nurturing the ecosystem of research, development, innovation and entrepreneurship in the country and highlighted the significant improvement of India’s Global Innovation Index ranking. He cited that India’s standing in term of resident patents, research publications, innovations and other R&D indicators have increased manifold during the last 10 years and the country is set to further improve its global innovation standing for promoting entrepreneurship and innovations.
Speaking on the occasion, Prof. Shakil Ahmad Romshoo, Vice Chancellor IUST briefed the secretary about the research and innovation standing of the university and acknowledged the support of SERB, DST, DBT, JKSTIC and other agencies for extramural funding of Rs. 55 crore to the IUST during the last two years for supporting research to address issues of societal importance. Prof. Romshoo stated that through Centre for Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development (CIED), a section 8 company, IUST has joined national efforts in promoting an ecosystem of entrepreneurship and innovations as envisaged under STIP and NEP-2020, in which promising youth from J&K are supported to incubate their ideas at the university. Prof. A H Moon, Dean Research IUST presented the concluding remarks and extended vote of thanks to the Secretary, SERB. He spoke about the university’s efforts to foster a culture of R&D, which has resulted in the registration of 27 inventions. Prof. Gupta also paid a visit to CIED at the university and showed a keen interest in the structure and functioning of the Centre.