Innovations will provide the impetus to ‘Make in India’: Pranab Mukherjee

 The Dollar Business Bureau The President of India, Pranab Mukherjee, called upon the need for innovation and generating ingenious solutions to overcome poverty, create employment and to ensure overall economic growth prosperity of India. Speaking at the inaugural session of ‘Festival of Innovations(FoI)’ on Saturday, the President said, “India’s knowledge system offers tremendous scope for research involving land-to-lab investigation and lab-to-land transfer of technology,” adding that the process of innovation converts knowledge into social good and economic wealth. Stating that as a part of innovation, there is a need to build viable linkages between all formal and informal sectors, the President expressed hope that the FoI initiative would bring different stakeholders across the country together on a single platform and make them active partners in inclusive innovation. He further highlighted the contribution of grassroots innovators and innovations by the MSME and the informal sector as prime considerations in India and said that the greater involvement of crucial stakeholders will provide the stimulus required for inclusive growth and development.  This will further result in deepening the involvement of the leaders of technological, financial and educational sectors with the mixture of creativity of common people and young students, the President added. Midway through this decade, the President said, “There is a need to assess and recalibrate India’s approach towards harnessing the creativity of her grassroots innovators and students.” Mentioning that India need to focus on increasing the scalability of grassroots innovations for a strong linkage between the existing knowledge bank and the formal education system, he also called for an active role of the nodal government agencies towards achieving this purpose. Aimed at improving productivity, efficiency, enhancing affordability and environmental quality, these innovations will provide a great impetus to the ‘Make in India’ mission of the government, the President added.  The Innovation Exhibition, an initiative by the Rashtrapati Bhavan, is expected to showcase novel solutions to problems in multiple domains such as engineering, agriculture, health and other socio-economic sectors. In this regard, the President called upon the Union and State governments to consider these innovations for wider diffusion through their administrative channels, particularly in economically backward regions, and tribal and remote areas.  The President also called for the protection and documentation of the vast repository of indigenous knowledge base. Referring to the facts that India is ranked 76th in the Global Innovation Index 2014, much below China which is at the 29th position and Russia at the 49th place and Brazil at 61th place, the President exuded confidence that India has enough capability to be a frontrunner in innovation and for this purpose, he called for the setting up of Innovation Cells across the country to welcome and collect innovative ideas.  

This article was published on March 07, 2015.