Decade of Innovation

President of India in her address to Parliament on 4th June 2009 mentioned that next ten years would be dedicated as a Decade of Innovation. Prime Minister of India in the 97th Session of Indian Science Congress held on 3rd January, 2010 at Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala also mentioned in his speech that the Government has declared 2010-2020 as the “Decade of Innovations”. The main aim of this declaration is to develop an innovation eco-system in the country to stimulate innovations and to produce solutions for the societal needs in terms of healthcare, energy, urban infrastructure, water and transportation.

The Ministry of Science and Technology is promoting innovations through various schemes such as Technopreneur Promotion Programme (TePP); technology business incubators under Science and Technology entrepreneurship Development scheme; Drugs and Pharmaceuticals Research; Innovation Clusters; Small Business Innovative Research Imitative (SBIRI); Biotechnology Industrial partnership Programme (BIPP); open source drug discovery (OSDD) projects and grass root innovations through National Innovation Foundation. Finance Minister in his budget speech on 26th February 2010 has announced increase of weighted deduction for expenditure incurred on scientific research and development from 150 per cent to 200 per cent by companies in an approved in-house research and development facility and weighted deduction for contribution to approved entities for the purpose of scientific research from 125 per cent to 175 per cent.

This was stated by Shri Prithviraj Chavan, the Minister of State (I/C) for Science and Technology and Earth Sciences in the Lok Sabha today.

Source: Press Information Bureau
Date: March 10, 2010