Dr Nemkumar Banthia, scientific director with IC-Impacts, University of British Columbia, tells SHAlINI SAKSENA how the centre brings researchers, industry and community leaders together to find key solutions to challenges that affect India and Canada
What was the reason for India-Canada collaborationIJ
To begin with we would gather an individual and publish a paper or two on issues like diabetes, AI, etc. We soon realised that this was not helping solve the bigger the picture. We decided to gather together our resources. It was back in 1992 when seven problem-solving centres came up and they were very successful. This helped us to collaborate with other universities to solve bigger problems. In 2011, there was a move to create an international centre. The Government then chose India which was a great move to create a centre of excellence.
What are some of the working areasIJ
There was a competition and 18 proposals came in areas of food security, automobiles of the future, aerospace, quantum computing. Our centre also submitted a proposal which was along the lines of infrastructure, water and health. The reason why we chose these areas was due to a number of workshops and networking that we did in India with IITs and All India Institute of medical Sciences. It was not Canada thinking what India needed. It was India who decided what Indian needed. Our centre won the competition and IC-Impact was born.
Can you elaborate on the pillars of IC-ImpactsIJ
First, is research and development. We have approximately 100 faculty members on both sides — India and Canada in active projects. Second, we have around 588 students in the programme. The third is the involvement of the industry — 70 of them. We have companies like Reliance, GMR, TCS, GE India are on board. In fact, almost all large Indian companies are involved. We also have dollar for dollar match. The fourth is community involvement. We take pride in taking our research directly to the community.
Can you tell us about some of the on-ground projects in IndiaIJ
We have built a road in a small village north of Bangalore. We used self-healing system and nano technology to build this road which is the most advanced road in the country right now. There is a bridge in Nagpur where we are in the process of putting sensors for water treatment projects. We are working with pharmacists in Bihar to deal with tuberculosis that goes largely untreated and ends up infecting 10 more people. We are training pharmacists that instead of giving them a cough syrup, they first ask them to go for an X-ray. This training can help diagnose the first symptoms of TB.
How heavily are the students involved in these projectsIJ
We take great pride in providing a lot of training to our students which is innovative. This means that we not only give them a traditional form of learning, we also want them to understand how they need to interact with the community respectfully. We send our students in to communities so that they can learn how to deal with cultural differences. We teach them how to work with industries and directly showcase their work.
Does India benefit more from this collaborationIJ
The centre is not about Canada or India. It is two countries working together. Canada has a lot to learn from India as well. India has certain strengths complimentary to ours. India has certain promises complementing to ours. We see this centre as perfect symmetry where people are working with each other without ever an assumption that one needs the other more than the first.
Is the funding set for a specific time-periodIJ
Yes, for now, the funding is untill 2021.