The Hindu : International / India & World : `Scientific partnership with Russia will benefit India'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Oct 03, 2004

International

International - India & World

`Scientific partnership with Russia will benefit India'

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW, OCT. 2. Russia is India's most important scientific partner and is helping it become a powerful nation, according to the Indian Ambassador to Russia, Kanwal Sibal.

Speaking at the opening of the 12th session of the Joint Council of Indo-Russian Integrated Long-Term Programme in science and technology (ILTP) here today, Mr. Sibal described cooperation with Moscow in science and technology as the "key factor in strategic partnership" between the two countries.

Success story

A high-power Indian delegation led by C.N.R. Rao, co-chairman of the ILTP Joint Council, and comprising seven secretaries from the Ministry of Science and Technology, has arrived here for themeet.

The Russian delegation is led by Gury Marchuk, Russian co-chairman of the Joint Council.

ILTP is the biggest and by far the most successful science and technology programme between any two nations. Since the inception of ILTP in 1987, India and Russia have jointly brought to fruition about 500 scientific projects and are now working on another 140 projects.

Speaking about them, Prof. Rao drew attention to the Indo-Russian Centre Gas Hydrate Studies set up in Chennai earlier this year.

New energy source

"If we succeed in extracting gas hydrates from the seabed it will provide a complete solution to the energy problems of India, Russia and many other countries," he told The Hindu.

India hopes to benefit from advanced research in Russia into gas hydrates as a new rich source of energy. "Russia is a great scientific nation and India will benefit greatly from collaboration with Russia in science and technology," he said.

While the scientific part of the programme has been an unmitigated success, the industrial application of joint research has lagged behind, speakers said.

V.S. Ramamurthy, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, urged greater involvement of industry in ILTP projects and pinned hopes in this regard on the CII-Russia technology summit in Delhi on October 19-20 in which 50 Russian science and technology centres would take part.

Both Prof. Ramamurthy and Prof. Rao called for greater involvement of young scientists from India and Russia in ILTP projects to create a solid basis for future bilateral cooperation.

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`Scientific partnership with Russia will benefit India'