Science and technology in India

After independence, <a href="/facts/Jawaharlal_Nehru/et3I8NGT">Jawaharlal Nehru</a>, the first <a href="/facts/Prime_minister_of_India/htYDwX0a">prime minister of India</a>, initiated reforms to promote higher education and science and technology in India. The <a href="/facts/Indian_Institutes_of_Technology/ytm1MuBU">Indian Institute of Technology</a> (IIT)—conceived by a 22-member committee of scholars and entrepreneurs in order to promote technical education—was inaugurated on 18 August 1951 at <a href="/facts/Kharagpur/rWkWpXL1">Kharagpur</a> in West Bengal by the <a href="/facts/Minister_of_Education_(India)/fg2QsNTJ">minister of education</a> <a href="/facts/Maulana_Abul_Kalam_Azad/noRhGyKe">Maulana Abul Kalam Azad</a>. More IITs were soon opened in <a href="/facts/Bombay/BdoEc10R">Bombay</a>, <a href="/facts/Madras/8ngv75bW">Madras</a>, <a href="/facts/Kanpur/THQSfYuP">Kanpur</a> and <a href="/facts/Delhi/Xa6CKgnf">Delhi</a> as well in the late 1950s and early 1960s along with the Regional Engineering Colleges (RECs) (now <a href="/facts/National_Institutes_of_Technology/NjclKzn1">National Institutes of Technology</a> (NIT). Beginning in the 1960s, close ties with the <a href="/facts/Soviet_Union/m7wWsPto">Soviet Union</a> enabled the <a href="/facts/ISRO/CdAoFQTL">Indian Space Research Organisation</a> to rapidly develop the Indian space program and advance <a href="/facts/Nuclear_power_in_India/y7Y6U9UV">nuclear power in India</a> even after <a href="/facts/Smiling_Buddha/vhxqMQR1">the first nuclear test explosion by India</a> on 18 May 1974 at <a href="/facts/Pokhran/gGzD1BrE">Pokhran</a>.
India accounts for about 10% of all expenditure on <a href="/facts/Research_and_development/2h5UddUu">research and development</a> in Asia and the number of scientific publications grew by 45% over the five years to 2007. However, according to former Indian science and technology minister <a href="/facts/Kapil_Sibal/7Rvar4zm">Kapil Sibal</a>, India is lagging in science and technology compared to developed countries. India has only 140 researchers per 1,000,000 population, compared to 4,651 in the United States. India invested US$3.7 billion in science and technology in 2002–2003. For comparison, China invested about four times more than India, while the United States invested approximately 75 times more than India on science and technology. Research and development spending grew to US$17.2 in 2020–2021.
While India has increased its output of scientific papers fourfold between 2000 and 2015 overtaking Russia and France in absolute number of papers per year, that rate has been exceeded by China and Brazil; Indian papers generate fewer cites than average, and relative to its population it has few scientists. In the quality-adjusted <a href="/facts/Nature_Index/HCAnyVGM">Nature Index</a> India was ranked ninth worldwide in 2023 and recorded faster growth than China in this year, albeit from a lower base.
India is ranked 39th in the <a href="/facts/Global_Innovation_Index/mIqcsoF4">Global Innovation Index</a> in 2024.

Science and technology in India open-in-new

Science and technology in India