51 years of the Department of Science and Technology (DST) sets the occasion for introspection of how far the mandate of the Department has been achieved and formulating the way forward, Secretary DST Dr S Chandrasekhar said at the 52^nd Foundation Day celebrations today.

“DST was set up to build a scientific platform for funding S&T research in the country. Later, translation of research was also included in the mandate. The Department has been successful in coordinating S&T across the country through support to R&D and translation in S&T. It was successful in contributing S&T for overcoming the pandemic. However, new challenges are emerging, and the Department has to gear itself up to help the country face these challenges,” DST Secretary pointed out.

Drawing the global climate change challenge as an example, Dr Chandrasekhar said that DST needs to invest in sectors that contribute to global warming. “We need to be more sensible, more conscious to challenges and develop the best of technologies that are sustainable. We need to do our homework about how to do our work better and better,” he added.

Dr Chadrasekhar appreciated the efforts of all the divisions and the autonomous institutions, the INSPIRE (Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research) and other programmes that have ‘inspired’ stakeholders ranging from students at different levels, researchers, scholars and faculty, the women’s programmes that have touched many lives, the SERB which has helped attract talents and the TDB which has helped translation of R&D and ideas for benefits of people.

“We are fortunate to work in a sector whose effect is eternal and all-encompassing. The vaccine produced here and the technology developed here can have applications in different parts of the world. Hence we need to think of ways that can help us reach the benefits of S&T in more effective ways,” DST Secretary stressed.

Highlighting that DST has been the mother department, Dr M Ravichandran, Secretary Ministry of Earth Sciences, said that it was necessary for the two departments to work more closely and in areas where they can complement each other.  

Prizes were distributed to employees of the Department who had won the different competitions ranging from cricket to music, quiz and poetry. A cricket bat and wickets developed by NECTAR, an autonomous institution of DST, was presented to the winners of the cricket tournament.

Senior Adviser, Dr Akhilesh Gupta, Shri Vishvajit Sahay, Additional Secretary and Financial Adviser, Shri Sunil Kumar, Jt Secretary, Dr Nisha Mendiratta, Head Climate Change Programme & WISE-KIRAN Division, participated in the programme, which was attended by Directors of Autonomous institutions along with DST officials.

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SNC/RR