Brain Drain to Brain Gain – UPSC GS3

Department of Science and Technology stats: The number of Indian-origin scientists working internationally and returning to India between 2012 and 2017 has jumped 70% from that from 2007 to 2012

Long plagued by “brain drain”, India has over the last decade ramped up schemes to attract Indian- origin scientists

This trend is primarily due to schemes such as the Ramanujan Fellowship Scheme and the Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research (INSPIRE) Faculty Scheme and the Ramalingaswami re-entry fellowship scheme coordinated by the Department of Biotechnology (DBT)

These schemes allow “high-caliber” Indian researchers working abroad to relocate to Indian institutes and universities of their respective interest and domain

The fellowship is meant for brilliant scientists and engineers from all over the world to take up scientific research positions in India, i.e. for those scientists who want to return to India from abroad

Ramanujan Fellowship are only for those candidates who are doing Post Doctoral abroad and not for the people who already have permanent position in a scientific organization in the country

The fellowships are scientist-specific and very selective

All Areas of Science (in the broadest terms) are covered by this Fellowship

The Ramanujan Fellowship duration is for 5 years only

The Ramanujan Fellows could work in any of the scientific institutions and universities in the country

They would be eligible for receiving regular research grants through the extramural funding schemes of various S&T agencies of the Government of India

This scheme is managed by Science and Engineering Research Board under the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India

INSPIRE is an innovative programme sponsored and managed by the Department of Science & Technology for attraction of talent to Science

The basic objective of INSPIRE is to communicate to the youth of the country the excitements of creative pursuit of science, attract talent to the study of science at an early age and thus build the required critical human resource pool for strengthening and expanding the Science & Technology system and R&D base

A striking feature of the programme is that it does not believe in conducting competitive exams for identification of talent at any level

It believes in and relies on the efficacy of the existing educational structure for identification of talent

INSPIRE has three components: