Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday may have added Jai Anusandhan (scientific research) to former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri's famous slogan of Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan and Atal Bihari Vajpayee's Jai Vigyan at an event at the 106th Indian Science Congress in Jalandhar, but a Parliamentary panel in its report has slammed the government for poor investment in research and development (R&D) sector in the country.
In a report highlighting the functioning of the Department of the Scientific and Industrial Research under the Science and Technology Ministry, the panel headed by Rajya Sabha MP Anand Sharma pointed out that the country's investment in R&D is dismal at 0.6 per cent of GDP, just a fraction when compared to investment made by US (2.8), China (2.1), Israel (4.3), and Korea (4.2) in the sector.
Referring to the Economic Survey 2017-18, the committee said that in most countries, the private sector carries out the bulk of R&D even though the Government play an important role in the area. "However, in India, the Government is not just the primary source of R&D but also the primary user of the funds, thus Government expenditure on R&D is undertaken almost entirely by the Centre.
"Private investments in research have lagged in India," said the panel. According to an analysis (Forbes, 2017) there are 26 Indian companies in the list of the top 2,500 global R&D spenders compared to 301 Chinese companies.
Nineteen of these 26 firms are in just three sectors: pharmaceuticals, automobiles and software. India has no firms in five of the top ten R&D sectors as compared to China that has a presence in each of them, said the report which was tabled in Parliament recently.
The Committee stressed upon the Central Government to substantially enhance the investment in R&D in the country.
"The Committee feels that Department must evolve some institutional mechanism to involve private companies/ industries for investing towards R&D by providing them some kind of incentives like tax benefits etc," as per the report.
Regarding the functioning of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), it said that the premier research agency has not been able to translate its good work done in the form of research papers into sustainable technologies for use of the masses.
Addressing the 106th Indian Science Congress at Jalandhar, the Prime Minister had said that through science, India was transforming its present and working to secure its future.
He also said the country's strengths in research and development are built on the backbone of its national laboratories, central universities, IIT, Indian Institute of Sciences, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research & Indian Institute of Science Education and Research.
However, noting that over 95 per cent of the country's students go to state universities and colleges, he called upon for developing a strong research ecosystem in these institutions.