Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Chair CSIR Society Meeting tomorrow
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will chair the meeting of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) Society tomorrow morning. All the members of the CSIR Society have been invited for the meeting.
The CSIR is a Society under the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Ministry of Science & Technology and the Prime Minister is the Society’s President.
The Union Minister for Science & Technology, Dr Jitendra Singh, being the Vice President of CSIR, Nirmala Sitaraman, Union Minister of Finance and Piyush Goyal, Union Minister of Commerce and Industry will also be present. The CSIR Society comprises eminent scientists, industrialists, and senior officials of scientific ministries. The Society meets annually to review CSIR activities and deliberate on its future programmes.
Briefing the media, about the CSIR Society meeting and achievements of CSIR, Dr Jitendra Singh said, CSIR’s research efforts are now mainly focussed on green energy technologies, STI interventions to generate employment and raise income levels in rural India. He said, strengthening self-reliance across industrial sectors, facilitating infrastructure developments, and developing critical S&T human resources are also the mandate of CSIR and the R&D conglomerate is adopting Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning platforms for its scientific pursuits.
Dr Jitendra Singh said, the revitalisation of CSIR as per the CSIR Vision 2030 and aligned to National Vision@2047 is being focussed on making India a scientific powerhouse and self-reliant by becoming a technology provider for the nation.
Carrying forward the vision of the Prime Minister for greater integration of schemes and themes, Dr Jitendra Singh said, at present, CSIR has strengthened its engagement with the industry, leading to increased industry partnership and collaboration in CSIR funded projects. In addition to the PPP model, being practised in Energy Theme, few CSIR labs have facilitated sustainable start-ups to promote CSIR technologies pertinent to Agri-bio- nutritech, Specialty Chemicals, Aerospace and Healthcare themes.
The Minister further informed that waste-to-wealth driven technologies of 4M theme and extraction-cum-purification of wide variety of metals have attracted few start-ups and MSMEs too. Hydrazine Hydrate production plant at Gujarat is the recent proof of CSIR’s technology from Chemicals Theme, reaching newer heights and leading to import substitution.
Dr Jitendra Singh also underlined that CSIR’s aroma mission and purple revolution in Jammu and Kashmir have changed the history as India as exporter instead of India as importer. Steel slag road in Maharashtra, water mapping using CSIR’s heliborne technology are few other examples of CSIR’s closer association with Line Ministries, driven through Civil cum infra structure and E3OW thematic projects of CSIR, the Minister added.
Dr N Kalaiselvi, Secretary, DSIR and DG, CSIR in her presentation said that CSIR’s activities are carried out through 37 laboratories and 39 outreach centres spread across India. Established in 1942, CSIR completed its 80th year recently, and in its long history, CSIR has made many significant contributions to the Indian industry and society at large. During the COVID-19 pandemic, CSIR laboratories developed numerous technologies to manage the pandemic.
Dr. TV Somanathan, Finance Secretary & Secretary Expenditure, Dr. Ajay Kumar, Secretary, Department of Defence Production, Ministry of Defence, Shri K. Sanjay Murthy, Secretary, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Dr. Rajiv Bahl, Secretary, Department of Health Research, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Dr. Himanshu Pathak, Secretary, Department of Agricultural Research Education (DARE), Dr. Samir V. Kamat, Secretary, Department of Defence Research and Development (DDRD) and Chairman, Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Dr. Srivari Chandrasekhar, Secretary, Department of Science & Technology, Ministry of Science & Technology, Dr N. Kalaiselvi, Secretary, DSIR and DG, CSIR, Dr. M. Ravichandran, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Dr. Rajesh S. Gokhale, Secretary, Department of Biotechnology, Shri K. N. Vyas, Secretary, Department of Atomic Energy and Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission, Shri S. Somanath, Secretary, Department of Space and Chairman, Space Commission & Indian Space Research Organisation, Shri Gurdeep Singh, Chairman and Managing Director, National Thermal Power Corporation Limited, Shri C.B. Ananthakrishnan, Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL), Dr. Nalin Shinghal, Bharat Heavy Electricals Limited (BHEL) Shri Sandeep Kumar Gupta, Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL), Prof. Ajay Kumar Sood, Principal Scientific Adviser to Govt of India, Prof. K. VijayRaghavan, Former Principal Scientific Adviser to the Govt. of India, Dr. Vijay Bhatkar, Eminent Scientist, Shri Baba A. Kalyani, Chairman and Managing Director, Kalyani Group, Bharat Forge Limited are some of the main participants to join the CSIR Society meeting tomorrow.