Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) Science & Technology; Minister of State (Independent Charge) Earth Sciences; MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh today said, Artificial Intelligence as one of the frontier technologies is shaping India’s present and future economy. He said, the country has started seeing the impact of Artificial Intelligence across healthcare, agriculture, education, governance and financial services.

Addressing the 27^th edition of DST-CII Technology Summit 2021 with Brazil, Canada, Russia &the Netherland as country partners in New Delhi, Dr.Jitendra Singh said, innovation ecosystem in India is providing companies new opportunities to create value, evolve and grow. He said, India is at the pivotal point with the technologies shaping up for the future like Artificial Intelligence, Advanced manufacturing, block chain, green energy, quantum computing, getting ready to make one of the biggest technology transformations of the century.

Dr Jitendra Singh said that Government of India, under the able leadership of our Prime Minister Narendra Modi is creating an enabling innovation ecosystem with recent reforms like design linked incentives for semi-conductors, PLI schemes for automobiles, drone policy and removing barriers through initiatives like faceless assessment.

The Minister said, in recent past, India has launched  several other flagship initiatives as well such National Mission on Interdisciplinary Cyber Physical Systems(ICPS); Quantum Computing and Communication;  National Mission on Supercomputing, Electric Mobility, Green hydrogen etc.DST has been working closely with CII for various policy measures towards R&D including the New Science, Technology and Innovation policy, and the technology vehicles like GITA.

Dr Jitendra Singh said, the time is now ripe for us to take these to the next level and I am very happy that the platform like DST-CII Technology Summit offer a plethora of opportunities for collaborations in the critically important technology areas across sectors such as healthcare, water, agriculture, energy, IT, digital and several others. He said, as we enter and celebrate the glorious 75 years of India’s Independence- our AzadikaAmritMahotsav, the time is opportune to appreciate, and evaluate our evolutionary journey, and set us on a path of technology leadership, fueled by the spirit of Atmanirbhar Bharat.

The Minister said, lately, pandemic has changed the rules of the game for ever. We have been experiencing disruption in business models across industries. Digitization has provided an impetus especially to the startup ecosystem in India and it is radically transforming India by catapulting grass root level innovation.

Dr Jitendra Singh informed that DST (Department of Science & Technology) has made concerted efforts in cultivating and promoting scientific temperament amongst the masses and is leading the innovation drive in the country. He said, as the largest extra-mural STI funding agencies in the country, DST is boosting India’s entire innovation value chain comprising researchers, entrepreneurs, academic and research institutes, startups, industry, and so on.

There are several initiatives being taken by DST, some of them include:

1. 1. A national programme titled NIDHI (National Initiative for Developing & Harnessing Innovations), which addresses the entire value chain of Innovations. NIDHI significantly impacted India’s innovation ecosystem by nurturing 3,681 startups through a network of 153 incubators created by DST, which generated more than 65,000 jobs as cumulative direct employment, and generated nearly 2000 intellectual properties
   2. Sophisticated Analytical & Technical Help Institutes (SATHI) is a new scheme to build a shared, professionally managed, S&T infrastructure for industry, MSMEs and Startups. This will provide easy access for pursuing research on high end and sophisticated equipment and will further strengthen the innovation ecosystem.

DrJitendra Singh congratulated CII for launching the STRIDE Journal and said that initiatives like this will provide the right impetus for achieving Indian Technology, Social and Economic goals.

MrFoccoVijselaar, Vice Minister, Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, The Netherlands, Dr S Chandrashekhar, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India, Mr TV Narendran,President CII (2021-2022) and CEO & Managing Director, Tata Steel Limited, Mr Marten van den Berg, Ambassador of the Netherlands to India, MrVipinSondhi,Chairman, CII National Committee on Technology, R&D and Innovation, and MD and CEO, Ashok Leyland Ltd., MrChandrajit Banerjee, Director General, Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Mr Sanjeev K Varshney, Head, International Cooperation, Department of Science & Technology, Government of India took part in the Summit.

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