Plans to double spending on S&T: Ashwani Kumar

Updated on: Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Seeking to give a boost to research and development, government has proposed doubling of funds to six science-related departments to over Rs 1.5 lakh crore in the 12th Five Year Plan.

The Ministry of Science and Technology has made the proposals to the Planning Commission during discussions on the 12th Plan.

Six science-related departments Departments of Science and Technology; Scientific and Industrial Research; Biotechnology; Earth Sciences; Space and Atomic Energy together have allocations of about Rs 78,000 crore in the 11th Plan.

"We need a much larger budget for science and technology. We intend to double this to Rs 1.5 lakh crore on an overall basis," Minister of State for Science and Technology Ashwani Kumar told reporters here.

Kumar said he had raised the issue during the full meeting of the Planning Commission presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

"We have committed that this must go up to at least 1.5 to two per cent of the GDP (during the 12th Plan)," he said.

Kumar said he would encourage all state-run scientific establishments to give submit detailed plans for futuristic research.

He said the government was also considering a proposal to make available Rs 5000 crore for exascale computing which is an attempt to move computing capabilities beyond the existing, successful petascale supercomputers.

Plans to double spending on S&T: Ashwani Kumar

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