Govt offers hefty sums to attract talented NRIs

The government has decided to offer lucrative packages to attract the best Indian-origin talent across the globe. A report by Chetan Chauhan.

Updated on: Sep 5, 2008, 24:19:31 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

Prefer HTon Google

Share via

Copy link

Finally, India has decided to start a talent hunt to strengthen its research base in the biomedical field in the countries’ laboratories. The government has decided to offer lucrative packages to attract the best Indian-origin talent across the globe.

The Cabinet on Thursday decided to offer salaries up to Rs 1 lakh per month to researchers to work in Indian research laboratories. It approved setting up of a Special Purpose Vehicle to manage Rs 1,296 crore — to be equally contributed between the Department of Bio-Technology and Wellcome Trust of UK for the next 10 years. The SPV will have two trustees, an Indian and a representative of Wellcome Trust.

“The aim is to attract top class professionals of Indian origin to work in institutes for high-end biomedical research to make a global impact,” said a senior official of the department.

The Prime Minister is to launch India’s first such programme next week. Modelled on China’s success in getting back researchers, the government believes that the programme will help India improve its global record on producing Ph.D scholars. About 6,000 Ph.Ds are awarded in India every year as compared to 25,000 in China and 15,000 in Brazil.

Under the programme, the early career fellow would get up to Rs 7.16 lakh per annum, intermediate fellows up to Rs 9.65 lakh and senior fellows up to Rs 12.83 lakh per annum.

Besides the salary package, they will also get high-end medical facilities for themselves and their families. But only those who have proven global record on biomedical research can apply.

Every year 70 fellowships will be awarded under the programme in different areas of bioresearch. The selected candidates would be attached with different institutes to prove leadership in biomedical research, an area of international importance.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

Follow India news real-time updates and the latest news covered on Hindustan Times, featuring today's critical updates on Sonam Wangchuk LIVE and more across India.