Open Forum

New Delhi, 1 October 2025

Innovation & Tech Expertise

INDIA MUST MEET CHALLENGE

By Dhurjati Mukherjee 

The enhanced H-1B visa structure has repercussions alright. However, if the same talent that goes to the US and sets up innovative firms, stays at home instead, it will surely help our country. Importantly, the country needs an ecosystem that supports innovation, public infrastructure that can keep professionals in India. 

India has begun to move. The government’s India Semiconductor Mission has pledged billions in incentives to evolve an Indian ecosystem. Micron is setting up a memory facility in Gujarat while the Tatas has entered fabrication with serious intent. Global majors are investing and domestic start-ups are experimenting with chip design and AI hardware. 

Undeniably, India already wields formidable soft power. The next step is to convert that soft power into smart power and technological innovation. Its vision has rightly been to align IT talent, Global Capability Centres (GCCs) strength and semiconductor initiatives into one coherent strategy. It would cut across silos, blend capital with Research &Development and make India a producer, not just a buyer. Meanwhile, GCCs are presently handling core research in Artificial Intelligence, digitization, R&D and semiconductors. 

Here it would be pertinent to cite the example of South Korea, which gained semiconductor leadership through innovation of firms, universities and financers. Also, the case of China and Taiwan may be mentioned, thereby emphasising the need for the government to ensure fundamental shifts in the research and innovation space. 

Thus, the core focus has to be in research so that Indian made ICT products have guaranteed buyers at scale. This can be possible by circulating talent across silos – researchers rotating into industry, industry engineers spending time in labs to design and innovate etc. India may consider declaring core ICT a strategic industry. That means more R&D funding to research institutions and active support in building resilience in chips, networks and secure digital infrastructure. This has to be the focus areas that the country once gave to space research and atomic energy programme. 

However, it needs to be pointed out that an increasing amount of evidence indicates that despite substantial spending in science, we are not getting adequate returns through new innovations. The era of transformative innovations that provided us with penicillin, electricity and later the internet may be transitioning into a period of gradual advancement. Notwithstanding a significant surge in research production, scientific endeavours’ relative originality is perhaps not being evident. 

Experts have observed that current research has been producing a diminishing number of breakthroughs. In sectors such as medicine, agriculture, Information and Technology and semiconductor technology resources necessary to sustain advancement may not be adequate in India. On the other hand, worldwide there has been a perceptible increase in funding but results are not quite encouraging. For example, statistics reveal that there has been a noticeable decline in the number of new drugs for every billion-dollar investment in research and development. 

Notably, earlier teams have generated ground-breaking work, possibly due to the fact that they had greater liberty to explore unconventional avenues and there was no pressure in taking classes or being involved in administrative work. The innovation slowdown is not a cause for despair but rather a clarion call for action. A vigorous scientific endeavour must provide greater knowledge and facilitate the environment for audacious, transformational thought. 

In spite of all this, India has to rise to the challenge. However, the role of the private sector leaves much to be desired as it has not cared to diversity and invest funds in research and innovation. Experts have rightly pointed out that India’s reply to the enhanced visas is for the government to act decisively, possibly by establishing a sovereign fund of around Rs 50,000 crore to channel into artificial intelligence, semiconductors, space and defence technologies, synthetic biology, the process of which has already started. It has been seen that slow and unpredictable procurement practices, specially by the US and also sometimes by China had hindered the growth of start-ups and MSMEs. 

This must change by putting the emphasis on the innovation dividend. Over the years, there have been claims of making indigenous computers, cell phones and an alternative to Whatsapp in India though the National Computing Mission is working on designing and installing supercomputers of various capacities. Access to these supercomputers is provided through the National Knowledge Network (NKN), another programme of the government that connects academic institutions and R&D labs over a high-speed network. It is an established fact that India has no shortage of talent and entrepreneurial skill. Moreover, the available Indian talent domestically can work on AI, robotics, chip manufacture and super computers. 

What is, however, missing is sovereign capital and access to anchor markets. The very companies that built India’s reputation as the world’s IT service provider have now to focus on design and innovation. The country’s start-up system remains robust and further boost needs to be provided. With the right policy push & public sector funding, India has the potential to emerge technologically equipped in the coming years to meet the emerging challenge. 

Though there is realisation within the government, it needs to be reiterated that if India wants to be a developed nation by 2047, there is no other option but to become the architect of our technological destiny. Meanwhile, an expert committee of scientists, engineers and technologists drawn from research institutions, universities and GCCs as well as from abroad, focused only on talent and academic performance, with no bias, should be formed not just to expedite the process but to draw up a plan for the coming three to five years. Moreover, foreign tie-ups in the area of technological expertise should be relentlessly pursued. The sooner, the better. ---INFA 

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