Union Minister of Commerce and Industry, and Textiles, Piyush Goyal has insisted to encourage start-ups and young scientists in niche areas like technical textiles.
During a review meeting of Textile Research Associations (TRA), the Minister also asked TRAs to submit proposals to the Ministry for any support they require to reach world-class level state-of-the-art labs, modern machinery, amongst others. The Bureau of Indian Standards could provide necessary support in modernising the labs of TRAs.
In consonance with the vision to foster innovation and drive science-centric sustainable growth, he suggested to create a special fund to increase the number of scientists in TRAs.
He noted that medical textiles research is incomplete without clinical trials. Therefore, costs associated with clinical trials may also be taken into account while recommending future projects in technical textiles.
The Minister directed the officials to fast-track the clearance of patents filed by Government related bodies, in a time bound manner.
The review meeting was attended by Dr VK Saraswat, Member (Science and Technology), NITI Aayog; Prof. Ajay K. Sood, Principal Scientific Adviser (PSA) to the Government of India; and representative of 8 TRAs namely, Ahmedabad Textile Industry’s Research Association (ATIRA) Ahmedabad; The Bombay Textile Research Association (BTRA) Mumbai; Man-Made Textiles Research Association (MANTRA) Surat; Northern India Textile Research Association (NITRA) Ghaziabad; Synthetic & Art Silk Mills Research Association (SASMIRA) Mumbai; South India Textile Research Association (SITRA) Coimbatore; Wool Research Association (WRA), Thane; and Indian Jute Industries’ Research Association (IJIRA)Kolkata.
Prof Ajay K. Sood highlighted the importance of having incubation centres in TRAs and emphasised on the need to research on HEPA filters, which has a huge potential in future.
