During his visit to the US this month, Prime Minister A.B. Vajpayee could announce a venture which many feel will help change the face of scientific and technical research in India.
The Global Science and Technology Institute (gsti) is a $1-billion project conceived by Dr Purnendu Chatterjee, president of the New York-based The Chatterjee Group (tcg) who, along with Rajat Gupta, ceo of management consultancy firm McKinsey, and other successful nris, is also involved in setting up the state-of-the-art Indian School of Business in Hyderabad.
Helping Dr Chatterjee in the venture are a host of former iitians. Besides Gupta, there are other US-based tycoons like Gururaj Desh Deshpande and his wife Jayshree Deshpande, whose Sycamore Networks is one of the worlds hottest new technology companies, valued at more than $38 billion; database millionaire tycoon Vinod Gupta (who set up the Vinod Gupta School of Business at his alma mater, iit Kharagpur) and Arjun Malhotra, co-founder of the hcl group and currently chairman & ceo of Techspan Inc.
The pmo and mea are currently studying the feasibility report of the venture which the consortium wants to start in two years time in two to three cities in the country. Initial talks for collaboration have started with a host of American universities like the Berkeley, Washington State, Michigan State at Dearborn and Northwestern.
"See it as an offering to the nation. We are raising money not only from nris but a host of Indians," Kishore Bhattacharya, a consultant with tcg, told Outlook, adding that Indian corporate captains like Infosys chairman .R. Narayanamurthy, Wipro head Azim Premji and Reliance boss Mukesh Ambani have offered help. So have a host of states like Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu with offers of cheap land and infrastructural facilities.
Bhattacharya says a host of nris currently teaching abroad and some of the best talent from scientific and technology institutes will be on the panel of gsti, which will - initially - accommodate about 400 students: "Research is the base of all future work and there are hardly any such world-class institutes in India. The students will do research and experimentation (under one roof) on a host of subjects, design programmes for all sections of the society and complement scientific knowhow."
That would definitely be good news.
