Union Minister of State for Science and Technology; Minister of State for Earth Sciences; MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances, Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space, Dr Jitendra Singh today said that under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the last 9 years have witnessed a quantum leap in India’s space journey and India is now at par with countries like the US. who started their space journey several years or decades before us.
Speaking to a popular private digital outlet, Dr Jitendra Singh said that though India’s space journey started much later, after PM Modi came in, he gave special support to the space sector and opened it up for public private sector participation growing number of Startups.
Today, the situation is such that the first and foremost space organizations like the US NASA are collaborating with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and even seeking expert inputs from us.
ISRO is working with nearly 150 private startup
The minister said that before 2014, ISRO was conducting launches here and there, but after Prime Minister Modi opened the doors of the space sector to private sector participation, today ISRO is working with nearly 150 private startups.
Recently, ISRO launched a record 104 satellites aboard PSLV-C37 from the Satish Dhawan Space Center at Sriharikota, of which 101 belong to international customers, marking India’s growing presence in the global space industry. Additionally, the original human space mission Gaganyaan is almost ready to carry Indians into space. If successful, India will be the fourth country to send a man into space, the other three being the US, Russia and China. he added.
India’s StartUp revolution
Talking more about India’s StartUp revolution, the minister said that before 2014 there were only around 350 StartUps, but after Prime Minister Narendra Modi called from the ramparts of the Red Fort in his Independence Day speech and launched a special StartUp scheme in 2016, to a quantum leap in the number of startups to over 90,000 with over 100 unicorns.
India also has the third largest StartUp ecosystem in the world and jumped from 81st to 40th in the Global Innovation Index 2022. Similarly, before 2014, India’s bio-economy was valued at $10 billion. Now it’s more than $80 billion. Biotech startups have grown 100 times in the last 8 years from 52 odd startups in 2014 to 5300 plus in 2022, the minister said.
Talking about Agri tech StartUps, Dr Jitendra Singh said that before 2014 nobody knew about Aroma mission or Purple revolution. But today lavender farming has led to a boom in Agri tech StartUps. Similarly, there was no concept of preventive healthcare in India before 2014, but today the same India is recognized as the vaccine hub of the world.
Dr. Jitendra Singh emphasized the need to sustain the start-up movement and urged the industry to become an equal partner in the fast-growing sector. The minister also emphasized on the integration of start-up, research, academia and industry to make it a win-win proposition for all.
Agriculture is one of the important pillars of the Indian economy as 54 percent of the Indian population is directly dependent on agriculture and it contributes about 20 percent of the GDP.
The Union Minister said that the government’s focus in the last 9 years has been on employment generation and capacity building of our youth. The Union Minister further said that hard work for the people led to faith in the leadership of India. He added that this new modus-operandi and the new culture of our polity was supported by our citizens who once again believed in the government.
Dr. Emphasizing that 2023 is an important year for India to assume the G20 presidency, Jitendra Singh said that in 2023, under the leadership of the Prime Minister, India has launched some path-breaking initiatives such as LIGO, India Space Policy 2023 and National Quantum Mission making India. part of an elite club of nations that possess quantum.
Written by: Vaishali verma
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