STATE TIMES NEWS
BERLIN: Soon after his arrival here on Sunday, Union Minister, Dr Jitendra Singh, who is part of the Prime Minister’s official delegation, met Indian Start Ups students and young professionals and held nearly a two hour long interaction with them.
The Minister appealed to them to avail of various fellowships, joint training programmes and professional options initiated by the government headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
He told the Indian students, some of whom are doing Post Doc, doctoral and Master degrees, to avail of wonderful new opportunities back home to do cutting-edge research in Science, Technology and Innovation.
Dr Jitendra mentioned that those students doing Post Doc assignment here, and would like to return can apply for Ramanuja Fellowships by Department of Science and Technology for researchers in all areas and Ramalinga Swamy Fellowships by Department of Biotechnology for researchers in Biotechnology, Health Sciences, Agricultural Sciences.
The Minister said that both these fellowships provide immediate placement of 3 years, which could be extended by another 2 years. He added that this is an adequate period to prove one’s worth and get absorbed in an academic/ research organisation in India.
Dr Singh also pointed out that DST offers INSPIRE fellowships, at various levels, which include both doctoral and post-doctoral. This is a five year assignment in an academic organisation, where one could take academic and research assignments.
Dr Jitendra also underlined that Indo-German Science & Technology Centre (IGSTC) has offered few fellowships like Paired Fellowships (young scientists in India and Germany need to make a Pair), Women in Science, Education & Research (WISER) – for placement of women researchers in ongoing projects, and Industrial fellowships – to provide exposure to Indian students in German industrial ecosystem.
Moreover, the Minister informed that India and Germany have bilateral programs with a number of German organisations, including Ministry of Education & Research (BMBF), German Academic Exchange Program (DAAD), and German Research Foundation (DFG).
He said, these programs provide opportunities for 3-5 years research collaboration between Indian and German organisations.
If someone is currently working in a German organisation and his or her Professor has a collaborative project under any of these programs, one can get an opportunity to work with Indian organisations, while you are still working in Germany.
Similarly, Dr Jitendra flagged other opportunities like VAJRA, GIAN, SPARC and said that under these programmes, inter-institutional activities are developed between Indian and collaborative institutes and participation of young students are encouraged in all these activities. Two other schemes are ICMR International Fellowships – for Medical Students and ICAR International Fellowships – for Agriculture Students.
