New Delhi: A National Research Foundation (NRF), dedicated solely for the purpose of research and innovation, was announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman Friday during the presentation of the first Union budget of the second Narendra Modi government.
As reported in the ThePrint last month, the proposed NRF is likely to play the same role in research and innovation that the University Grants Commission (UGC) plays in higher education — an umbrella regulatory body.
The NRF will be a body set up under an Act of Parliament and consist of four major divisions — science, technology, social science and arts and humanities. It will competitively fund research across all disciplines.
The proposal to set up the NRF was also mentioned in the National Education Policy (NEP) draft formulated by a committee led by eminent scientist K. Kasturirangan. The NEP draft was submitted to the central government in May.
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Rs 400 crore proposed for ‘Institutes of Eminence’
Sitharaman also proposed allocation of Rs 400 crore for ‘Institutes of Eminence’, as part of the government’s plan to create “world-class institutions”.
Six institutes, including IIT-Delhi, IIT-Bombay and the yet-to-be established Jio Institute, have already been declared ‘Institutes if Eminence’ by the government.
“Today, we have two IITs and IISc in the world rankings. There is a need to develop more such institutes,” Sitharaman said.
The government also proposed three times more budget than last year for the ‘Study in India’ programme, which is aimed at attracting foreign students to study in India.
Mentioning about the NEP draft, Sitharaman said: “The new National Education Policy will be brought in to bring in major reforms in the education system. Major changes in higher education and school education also planned.”
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Politicians in power will always (mis)use public money to buy votes. Spending Rs 400 crores to set up yet another new IIT in a backward area is a sure formula to harvest votes. All the IITs since the original 5 are beneficiaries of India’s rotten political system that is called democracy. The most blatant abuse was including Roorkee and BHU into the IIT system in order to get votes in UP which already had IIT Kanpur. Among the original 5 IITs, Delhi has been getting unfair advantage due to its location ( just as the residents of the NCR , typical of Third World capitals, have been hogging Govt expenditure of Taxes collected from the rest of the country ) and should be SHUT DOWN and turned into offices for ALL the other IITs to liaison with the Central Govt.
As it seems that these days there are many under employed IIT graduates they best that they can do is organize a political party of technologists and meritocracists to replace the clueless animal worshipping morons who have held India back since Independence.
Please atleast first improve the education status of our central universities. Make investment in them, why only iit and iisc just to show off brand. Education system in india is decreasing day by day. Researchers are not given good payment no recognition, no level of it due to which either they work at that level or leave country. Make decisions regarding qualities not regarding brands. Which will only increase competition and stress level of students.
Totally bhasan, govt do not increasing the minimum requirements of research students stipend amount, after a long protect of whole Ph.D scholar.
Then how students can work for research in India.
New IITs which were opened during Manmohan Singh govt in 2008-9 are still struggling for lack of infrastructure. Even buildings and campus couldn’t be developed in last 10 years in this modern era where lit of machines are available. Whereas old iits we’re completed in three years. We Indians are still focusing on free distribution of money and facilities to poors instead of bringing them to work.
First assure a corruption less faculty recruitment process in IIITs, NITs, IITs, IIEST and CSIR labs.
Creation of more IIT and IISc would not give us tag of eminence globally rather efforts should be made to strengthen and streamline the existing infrastructure of the institutes. By increasing the number of the institutes,we can’t increase the quality, rather we will dilute the standard what we require today or in future. The basic concept should be to tap the best talent from the market and groom them to such level that he/she can compete in the world market in the area of scientific research and development. To achieve our dream target,we need best quality faculties, excellent infrastructure, attract major corporates and MNCs for full placement of the young Freshers as per their specialisation.
We have large no. of scientific and technical institutes which can be upgraded to National or International level by improving their standards through pumping sufficient funds, creating R&D base and augmenting resources to the highest level.
We have to increase qualitatively and not quantitatively otherwise we will miss global recognition in the scientific research and development. Time has now come to give more focus on RESEARCH and RESEARCH in all scientific areas which would add our prominence in each and every field.
There is only one Harvard, only one Oxford, only one Yale, only one LSE and only one MIT in the world. Sitharaman’s husband went to LSE for his PhD and her daughter studied journalism in Yale. The more IITs and IISc they will open, the more the IIT/IISc brand value will erode. Already the IITs are just like any central university now under total control of MHRD babus, and this will lead to complete dilution of IIT brand. Furthermore, the market for science and technology graduates in India is completely oversaturated now. Even M.Tech and PhD students from IITs are applying for low level sarkari babu jobs now and B Tech students are studying for IAS exams rather than core jobs.
It is so funny that IITs are made with 400 crore rupees… How could u say like funny speeches like the Modi…. Jio ko kyun Dia centre of excellence… As ambani provides money for election…. Research Kaise karte hein Kaise hota hai USA se puchho…. Shame on this budget as it is only a paper document for to be slapped on the poor and nothing else…… Diesel and petrol become costlier…. Badhai Ho Dharmendra Pradhan……. Aap to Chha gaye…. 2.0 Pheku govt ke Pheku budget…. 👺👺👺👺👺👺👺👺
Why isn’t the government providing more stipend for research purposes so that more and more students can take pursue their career in research and have a PhD.
FIRSTLY WHY YOU DON’T REMOVE THIS CORRUPTED BOARDS WHICH IS THE SO CALLED PRE-REQUISTE CONDITION FOR IITS NAD NITS? RUINING THE FUTURES OF THE FUTURE OF TOMORROW’S IITIANS.
In India nearly every eligible Indian die to become IAS and involve in severe corruption,
enjoy royal status. Higher education is looked down upon in India.
Do you really print public comments? Or are these few comments ONLY YOUR COMMENTS???
Just another political gimmick. They’ll say, dekho humne IIT bana diya. But they don’t know what is needed to run an IIT. The universities are not hiring permanent faculty members for ages, even temporary members are not regularly paid. First come clean on what you can immediately do.
All modern knowledge that we currently have came from Western and Arab sources.
Wow nyc
But programming an institutions is not a mass there must be a luxurious placement for each and every students of the institutions. As per my views I heard that many of the engineers of india has no placement and they committed suicide as there investment is much more than that they earn after qualification. So please do give a well placement.
Only programing of new institute is not a mass there must be well and luxurious placement for all the students. As per my views I heard that many of engineers dont get happy life instead they commit suicide as the investment is more in the institute as they earn after there education. ….
Until and unless intellect gets priority over reservation nothing will happen.No chance to compete with eminent institutions.
This is completely wrong. You are supporting castism. From your comment it appears that all faculty members are only from reserved category, which is completely wrong. You are completely unaware of faculty demography in IITs. There are so many mukherjee s and brahmins in several IITs since past 60 years. How many nobel prizes have they brought to India?
We need to strengthen IITs & IISc by inducting best faculty and enough funds. Also there must be a greater interaction between these institutions and nation as a whole to improve systems and life.
I left a comment, where is that ?
Already new IITS are lower down in the college ranking, in the name of IIT COACHING most of the classes with less than 5% success rate are minting money, anyways the brand and the quality is going down , most of the coaching industry is full of iitians….develop a plan to utilise THEIR BRAIN POTENTIAL FOR NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT rather than providing IIT degree (and then they end up being coaching centre marketing instrument)
Instead of building new IITs ,the govt should upgrade the existing engineering colleges (both private and public as per the ranking in that particular state ) to IIESTs …building a new institute would take much time and planning and to propel it to the world rankings would take years.Instead, if the govt focuses on upgrading the existing institutes in each state to an IIEST (through ppp mode) it would add momentum to the already well performing institutes and would also have chances of featuring in the world rankings, it would also reduce the cost of providing the youth quality education, it would also create a new line of cfti meant for the betterment of a nation.A few private institutes which have the potential to be an IIEST are BIT mesra, VIT, THAPAR,Manipal and KIIT in the private domain and among the public ones are COEP, CUSAT, OSMANIA,HBTI etc.Apart from this the century old curriculum needs to be overhauled and replaced with a new one which is more in tune with the industry needs.Setting up of local engineering departments(LEDs) under the purview of municipal corps and zila parishads in cities and rural areas ,which would cater to the local problems in that area, and the engineers in these LEDs should be directly recruited from these engineering colleges.Today I see people complaining there are hardly any core engineering jobs available due to which people are studying mech, civil, electrical for 4 years and ending up in the IT sector, because that seems to be more “promising”.Our society is plagued with problems of water scarcity, droughts, improper drainage, cleanliness etc to name a few. To overcome these challenges we need an army of skilled engineers who should be exposed to such problems and should be trained to find innovative yet economical solutions.Lastly, I would say what a doctor does to a human being an engineer does the same to our society
Why don’t you develop existing IITs first ? Your step to increase IIT will only tarnish the brand name IIT which is well known otherwise due to inferior quality of students getting admission therein…
Exactly, and if anything new is to be made why not upgrade existing engg colleges(both private/public) to IIEST
Needs more IITs… Yes… but how will you build an IIT with just 400cr?
VERY RIGHT FORESIGHT .IT IS THE AGE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN KIND MAY ONLY BENIFIT BY HARNESSING NATURE THROUGH SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY.
RIGHT NOW IT WILL BE MORE APPROPRIATE TO STRENGTHEN AND DEVELOP THE IITS AND INSTITUTIONS WHICH HAVE BEEN OPEND IN THE RECENT PAST IN THE COUNTRY OR ALLOCATE MORE FUNDS.