STIP 2020 can help India become future-ready to face situations like COVID-19
By TIOL News Service
NEW DELHI, DEC 04, 2020: EXPERTS from Niti Aayog and the Department of Science and Technology (DST) discussed how India's new Science, Technology and Innovation Policy (STIP) 2020 will make the nation future-ready to face situations such as COVID-19.
COVID-19 has hugely impacted the world, but it has also shown us the way forward, said Dr V.K. Saraswat, Member of Niti Aayog.
"The crisis has also compelled us to re-examine some of our fundamental assumptions about organisational norms, practices one should follow and offered developing countries the opportunity to reinvent and reboot their economy to become self-reliant. The use of science, technology, and innovation will play a pivotal role in dealing with such COVID-19 disruptions," Dr Saraswat added.
Emphasising on the role played by STIP 2020 at this critical juncture, Professor Ashutosh Sharma, Secretary of DST, said, "The policy is shaping up well to help us face the challenges of the future and make the country self-reliant."
He said that the policy will help democratisation of knowledge, boost research and development to make globally competitive products at greater pace and quality, and empower our industries in research and innovation in creating jobs.
"We have missed the bus in the past in few sectors, and that this has proved to be an obstacle in being Aatmanirbhar [self-reliant] in those fields. We cannot miss this opportunity now," he added.
STIP 2020, India's fifth national policy, aims to decentralize and take a bottom-up and inclusive approach to science, technology and innovation.
From open science to funding priorities, critical human capital to equity and inclusion, strategic technologies to traditional knowledge systems, science diplomacy to science communication this policy promises a renewed STI ecosystem for an Aatmanirbhar Bharat, an earlier statement from the government had said.