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On June 28, the Union Cabinet approved the National Research Foundation (NRF) Bill in Parliament. The NRF will be an apex body to provide high-level strategic direction to scientific research in India, aligning with the recommendations of the National Education Policy (NEP), 2023. The Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), created by an act of Parliament in 2008, will stand repealed and subsumed into the NRF.
The administrative department of the NRF will be the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government. of India. The governance of NRF will be formulated by a Governing Board, presided over by the Prime Minister, and comprising the Union Ministers of Science and Technology and of Education as Vice-Presidents, and eminent scientists representing various disciplines as members. An Executive Council, with the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India as its chair, will oversee the NRF’s functioning.
The principal reason to form the NRF is to foster collaboration among academic and research institutions, industry and government departments. The NRF will create a policy framework and regulatory processes that can encourage collaboration and increased spending by industry on research and development. Apparently, a Bill needed to be introduced because current laws do not easily permit a private organisation to contribute funds for research to a body, such as the NRF.
The NRF will play a pivotal role in seeding, nurturing and promoting research, innovation and development across universities, colleges, research institutions, and R&D laboratories. It will create an interface mechanism so that, in addition to the scientific and line ministries, the state governments and industries can also participate and contribute to scientific R&D. The Minister of State for Science and Technology Jitendra Singh, has said: “… we have eminent institutions like the IITs and IISc that get a bulk of research funding but State universities get very little… about 10 per cent of the research funds. The NRF will correct this.” He added: “The IITs do not need to depend on NRF because they have the infrastructure and the resources. But an innovative person, in a village, who wants to establish a start-up needs the money. The NRF will prioritise research funding and the Executive Council will decide on what areas need support.”
The NRF’s budget will be about Rs 50,000 crore for the period 2023 to 2028. About 70 per cent of this budget will be obtained from the private sector as research investments; the remaining amount will come from the government.
The formation of the NRF was discussed by the Prime Minister’s Science Technology and Innovation Advisory Council (PM-STIAC). In a report the PM-STIAC had noted that among many “impediments” for the conduct of scientific research, “an absence of integrated planning and coordination” was prime. The Council also felt that a mere increase in science funding was unlikely to result in high expectations of research outcomes; structural changes were required. The NRF’s formation was recommended.
The goals of the NRF are laudable and I welcome its formation. If governed and administered well, it will have a major positive impact on the science landscape of the country in 5-10 years. However, the devil is always in the details. Modalities of seeding, nurturing and promoting research by providing funds to less-endowed institutions and also monitoring outcomes should be transparent. A significant problem that the scientists have been facing is that proposed scientific projects are reviewed and sanctioned, but fund-release is often choppy. And, it has been choppy for many years. Projects that are sanctioned for funding for three years often do not receive the third year’s funds.
The reasons underlying choppy fund-release must be thoroughly investigated and correctional steps must be implemented. Else, the delivery promises made in a project proposal will often remain undelivered, and the NRF will not be impactful on the science landscape of our country.
India spends about 0.7 per cent of its GDP on R&D, lower than other BRICS countries China, over 2 per cent; Brazil and Russia more than 1 per cent; and, South Africa, 0.8 per cent. USA spends about 2.8 per cent; the global average is about 1.8 per cent. With the formation of NRF, a significant increase is expected; hopefully, in a few years India’s R&D expenditure will reach the global average. The lion’s share of the budget of NRF (more than 70 per cent) is expected to be borne by the industry. I am sure that adequate discussions have been held and strategies have been evolved to ensure fulfilment of this expectation. However, I hope that a Plan-B has also been evolved, should funds from the industry not be forthcoming in a timely manner. Otherwise, the progress of science will suffer.
The NRF is also expected to promote democratisation of science funding and, funding to find scientific solutions to some big problems facing our society. These are welcome moves. However, it is important to ensure that basic research and small-scale research proposals are not brushed aside.
Preparations are underway to merge some sets of government science institutions. It is unclear whether these mergers are for implementation of “structural changes” recommended by PM-STIAC. Merging institutions under an umbrella may promote crucially important interdisciplinary research. However, many of these institutions were formed to boost research on specific domains of science. It is hoped that with the mergers, support to some domains does not get badly reduced and that funds for mission-mode, mega projects, such as supercomputing and quantum computing, are not taken from the NRF budget; no funds will then be left for other research.
Parliamentary approval for the NRF is welcome. Scientific research is expected to get a big boost. Collaboration on science between industry and academia is expected to prosper. However, unless good governance mechanisms to administer the centralised fund are evolved with adequate discussion with stakeholders, implemented from day one and executed under strong monitoring, the perils of centralisation will become evident. Progress of science will then take a beating. The NRF will also encourage young researchers who have gone abroad to do their PhD or post-doctoral work to return to India. Intellectual capital will increase. Opportunities to carry out high-quality science will flourish. If the caveats of centralisation of research funding are addressed before the NRF starts to function, we may soon expect a tsunami of scientific research and development that will propel our country to a technologically advanced state and hugely enhance our prosperity.
The writer is Founder, National Institute of Biomedical Genomics and National Science Chair, SERB, Government of India
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