India and Russia Agree to Strengthen Collaboration in the Area of Information and Communication Technology Russia informed that they have developed a centre for Information and Communication Technology and would like to collaborate with India in this area. The issue came up for discussion when the Union Minister for Science, Technology and Earth Science, Dr. Harsh Vardhan met his Russian counterpart Mr. Dmitry Livanov, Minister of Science and Education of the Russian Federation on 28 October, 2015 in Moscow on the sidelines of the BRICS ministerial meeting. Indian side said that, India had launched National Super Computing Mission, jointly being implemented by the Department of Science and Technology and the Department of Electronics and Information Technology. India sought Russian assistance in development of high end technologies, both in software and hardware sectors (like Motherboard design; Direct Liquid Cooling Technology and Network Design technologies for supercomputers). Both sides expressed happiness on the fact that there is very strong and longstanding Indo-Russia cooperation in science and Technology. A new S&T Agreement was signed between DST and the Russian Science Fund, during the visit of the President of India to Russia in May 2015. Russian Minister emphasized the need of exchange of young scientists and researchers for building network and for exchange of ideas to address the global S&T challenges. In his response, Dr. Harsh Vardhan said, India is taking leadership for BRICS Young Scientist Forum and a Secretariat for coordinating all activities related to this Forum will be opened in India with Department of Science and Technology, of India as a coordinating point. Mr. Livanov also desired that both sides must develop mechanism for engaging industries in R&D. He said that Russia is keen to participate in India's Technology Summit & Knowledge Expo with wide participation of Russian scientists. Dr. Harsh Vardhan said, India will be happy to invite Russian scientists and students in these events. This will boost the bilateral exchange program of students, scientists and their networking. India already implemented several bilateral international R&D Projects involving Academia and Industries working on 2+2 model involving one academic institution and one industry from each country. Both sides agreed to explore possibilities to launch future joint Call for Proposals involving Industry. Indian Minister said that there are about 80-90 R&D labs doing very good research and they need assistance in technology commercialization and technology transfer.
