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4th National Level Exhibition and Project Competitions (NLEPC) Begins

Shri Ajit Kumar Seth, IAS, Cabinet Secretary to Govt. of India today formally inaugurated the 4th National Level Exhibition and Project Competitions (NLEPC ) here at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi. He visited the various stalls and saw the Science models brought by the children from different parts of the country and appreciated their amazing innovatives. Shri Seth was accompanied by Prof. K.Vijay Raghavan, Secretary, Department of Science & Technology, Former Secretary DST Dr. T.Ramasami, Smt. Rita Menon and other senior Scientists and officers from the M/o Science & Technology.

Speaking to media person Shri Seth said the young buds have definitely showed their mettle and the future awaits them for a prestigious contribution in the field of Science and technology. He said the unique programme of Ministry of Science and Technology Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research (INSPIRE) is a National Programme implemented for attraction of talent amongst students to study science and pursue career with research is a right platform for such events.

The basic objective of INSPIRE is to communicate to the youth of the country the excitement of creative pursuit of science, attract talent to the study of science at an early age and thus build the required critical human resource pool for strengthening and expanding the science and technology system and R&D base. The programme was launched on 13th December 2008. The implementation started during 2009-10.

INSPIRE Programme covers students in the age group 10-32 years, and has five components: INSPIRE Award (for 10-15 age group), INSPIRE Internship at a science camp with opportunity for interaction with global science leaders (for 16-17 age group), INSPIRE Scholarship for Higher Education (SHE) @ Rs 80000/ per year for continuing education at B.Sc. and M.Sc. levels (for 17-22 age group), INSPIRE Fellowship for doctoral research (for 22-27 age group) and INSPIRE faculty for assured career opportunity (for 27-32 age group).

In so far as INSPIRE Award component is concerned, more than 11 lakhs INSPIRE Awards have been sanctioned till date. About 47.61 % of the awardees are girls and 25.85% SCs/STs. (state wise details at Annexure-I). An amount of ` 673.81 crores has been spent so far on the scheme, out of which ` 118.25 crores have been released to the States/UTs to meet the expenditure in connection with organizing competitions at various levels. More than 7 lakh awardees have participated in the DLEPCs, and about 50000 best entries of DLEPCs have participated in the SLEPCs.

Under the INSPIRE Internship, as on date, about 1046 Science Camps have been held covering about 2.33 lakh students in the age group of 16-17 years, 40 Nobel Laureates and about 8000 resource persons participated in these camps. About 46000 scholarships for students in the age group of 17-22 years have been given and about 4100 INSPIRE Fellows in the age group of 22 -27 years have been enrolled so far. Finally, under the Faculty Award for Assured Career, 573 individuals have been awarded inspire faculty fellowship for initiating research work in various universities/ academic institutions/ laboratories in the country.

The first component, viz INSPIRE Award, is implemented centrally through the States/UTs. Under this scheme, during the five year plan period two students are selected from each school of the country for an INSPIRE Award of Rs.5000/- each for preparing a Science Project / Model. These awardees, who are students from classes 6th to 10th, then participate in a three tier competition: District, State and National Level. The projects exhibited are evaluated by a jury of experts. All the 29 states and 7 UTs are participating in the scheme.

Merit based selection of students for INSPIRE Awards is done by the Head Master / Head Mistress / Principal of each school, who is required to send nomination of best children, having aptitude for science, with all relevant details, to the District Education Authorities, who will send these to DST through State Education Authorities. All middle and high schools in the country, (having classes 6th to 8th) including private schools, are eligible to participate in the scheme.

Out of the 2573 projects participated in the three NLEPCs held so far, Patent Facilitating Centre (PFC) of TIFAC along with its team of patent experts scrutinized the exhibits and scouted the patentable inventions for patenting. 85 projects from 1st NLEPC were selected by PFC for filing patents with provisional specifications. After detailed examination, 10 patents have been filed with complete specification (As per the Annexure IIA). From 2nd NLEPC, 33 patents were filed with provisional specifications, and after further examination 6 patents are being filed with complete specification within prescribed time limits (As per the Annexure IIB). From 3rd NLEPC, after detailed examination, 12 patents have been filed with provisional specifications and are being pursued for filing with complete specifications (As per the Annexure IIC).

Considering its large scale, DST has started to e-manage the entire INSPIRE Award Scheme by using State-of-Art latest Information Technology which enables e-filing of nominations by the schools across the country, its processing by the District and State authorities as well as DST in accordance with the norms of the scheme. More than 2.5 lakh schools across the country have already registered under the online system.