In line with the Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi’s vision to improve the Human Resource Management practices in the Government through “Mission Karmayogi”, Cabinet Secretary, Shri Rajiv Gauba interacted with Secretaries of all Ministries/Departments on creation of Annual Capacity Building Plans of each Ministry/Department, during a workshop organised by the Capacity Building Commission (CBC) at Vigyan Bhawan today. An Approach paper on Annual Capacity Building Plans prepared by CBC was also launched on the occasion.
At the launch of the Approach Paper for creation of Annual Capacity Building Plans for Ministries/Departments, Shri Rajiv Gauba, Cabinet Secretary appreciated the initiatives of CBC and said that, the basic idea of “Mission Karmayogi” is to fulfil the mandate of democratising knowledge across all verticals and levels. He mentioned that within a short span of time, with the help of the Commission, over 1 lakh personnel of M/o Railways and Police forces have been trained under Mission Karmayogi. Over 200 contractual personal staff of several Union Ministers have also been trained.
Shri Gauba stated that Ministries / Departments under GoI have made considerable progress to move closer towards the vision of Hon’ble Prime Minister to focus on citizen centricity and national priorities. He appreciated various Ministries / Departments for taking up the initiative to start working on developing an Annual Capacity Building Plan.
Hailing efforts of various ministries and departments, Shri Gauba said that Ministries are doing a marvellous work in streamlining the functioning of the government through structured training and enhancing access to learning opportunities, optimising learning ecosystem and inculcating future-readiness from top to bottom level staff.
Shri Gauba echoed the words of the Hon’ble Prime Minister that there is a need to completely transform the government’s capacity building system. The Capacity Building Commission is moving along these lines and making positive impact for the Civil Service fraternity. He added that capacity building plans of the Ministries / Departments should enable officers to acquire overall competency in all spheres of their work. Shri Gauba stressed on the need to replicate best practices of one Ministry to other Ministries.
Shri Gauba also lauded the training module developed by Capacity Building Commission on ‘Stress Management’, calling it as an essential tool for the work force of Government. He favoured deep immersion method and suggested that it should be mainstreamed.
He emphasised the need for Annual Capacity-building plans (ACBPs) for all the Ministries, Departments, Organizations (MDOs) to overcome the challenges that India faced in the past. The Commission is mandated to facilitate the preparation of the Annual Capacity Building Plan for all Government of India Ministries, Departments and Organizations.
Secretaries of several Ministries made presentation on the occasion, enlisting their progress towards preparing Annual Capacity Building Plans for their respective Ministries.
The Union Cabinet in its meeting held on 07.09.2022 chaired by Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi granted ex post facto approval for the Memorandum of Understanding between the Government of the Republic of India and the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland on mutual recognition of academic qualifications signed on 25.04.2022.
Mutual Recognition of Qualifications between India and UK aims to promote academic collaboration and student mobility. The request from UK side to grant recognition to their One Year Masters Programme was considered, and during the meeting between the Education Ministers of the two countries held on 16 December 2020 in New Delhi, a decision was taken to set up a joint task force for this purpose. The first meeting was held on 04th February, 2021 and subsequently after detailed deliberations and negotiations both sides agreed on the draft MoU.
The MoU aims to facilitate the mutual recognition of educational qualifications, periods of study undertaken, documents related to academic degrees/qualifications and accreditation by educational institutions within the two countries. Professional degrees like Engineering, Medicine, Nursing and Para-Medical Education, Pharmacy, Law, and Architecture are out of the purview of this MoU. It will also facilitate establishment of Joint/Dual degree courses between Higher Education Institutions, one of our objectives under NEP 2020 for Intel-nationalization of Education.
This MoU will promote bilateral exchange of information about educational structure, programs and standards and increase mobility of students and professionals between the two countries. It will also encourage other areas of cooperation in education sector, development of study programs as mutually agreed upon by the Parties.
This MoU shall recognize equivalence in accordance with parity with regard to acceptability of qualifications as approved under national policy, law, rules and regulations of the two countries.
The Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi has approved the “Widening access of the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) database to users, besides patent offices”. The opening up of the TKDL database to users is an ambitious and forward-looking action by the Government of India. This will be a new dawn for Indian traditional knowledge, as the TKDL will drive research & development, and innovation based on India’s valued heritage across diverse fields. The opening up of the TKDL is also envisaged to inculcate thought and knowledge leadership through Bharatiya Gnana Parampara, under the New Education Policy 2020.
Indian traditional knowledge (TK) offers immense potential to serve national and global needs, therewith providing societal benefits as well as economic growth. For example, the traditional systems of medicine and wellness from our country, namely Ayurveda. Siddha, Unani, Sowa Rigpa, and Yoga are serving the needs of people from India and abroad even today. The recent COVID- 19 pandemic has also been witnessing extensive use of Indian traditional medicines whose benefits range from immune-boosting to symptoms-relief to anti-viral activity. Earlier this year in April, the World Health Organization (WHO) established its first off-shore Global Centre for Traditional Medicines (GCTM) in India. These demonstrate the continued relevance of traditional knowledge in address the current and emerging needs of the world.
The approval of the Cabinet to widen the access of the database beyond patent offices lays emphasis on integrating and co-opting traditional knowledge with current practices towards enhancing innovation and trade. The TKDL will act as an important sources of TK information for advancing knowledge and technology frontiers. The current contents of TKDL shall facilitate wider adoption of Indian traditional medicines, while also propelling new manufacturers and innovators to gainfully build enterprises based on our valuable knowledge heritage.
The TKDL can cater to a vast user base that would include businesses/companies {herbal healthcare (AYUSH, pharmaceuticals, phytopharmaceuticals, and nutraceuticals), personal care, and other FMCG}, research institutions: public and private; educational institutions: educators & students; and others: ISM practitioners, knowledge holders, patentees and their legal representatives, and government, among several others. The access to the TKDL database would be through a paid subscription model with a phase-wise opening to national and international users.
In future, more information on Indian traditional knowledge from other domains will be added to the TKDL database from the perspectives of the “3P – Preservation. Protection and Promotion”. While catering to its primary mandate of preventing grant of wrong patents on Indian traditional knowledge, the TKDL database will also push creative minds to innovate for better, safer and more effective solutions for a healthier and technology endowed population. India’s rich heritage shall lay a strong foundation for newer socio-economic developments.
About TKDL: The Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) is a prior art database of Indian traditional knowledge established in 2001, jointly by the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and Department of Indian Systems of Medicine and Homeopathy (ISM&H, now Ministry of AYUSH). The TKDL is a first of its kind globally and has been serving as an exemplary model to other nations. The TKDL currently contains information from existing literature related to ISM such as Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha, Sowa Rigpa and Yoga. The information is documented in a digitized format in five international languages which are English, German, French, Japanese and Spanish. TKDL provides information in languages and format understandable by patent examiners at Patent Offices worldwide, so as to prevent the erroneous grant of patents. Until now, access to the complete TKDL database is restricted to 14 Patent Offices worldwide for the purposes of search and examination. This defensive protection through TKDL has been effective in safeguarding Indian traditional knowledge from misappropriation, and is considered a global benchmark.
The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi was apprised of the signing of Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to establish collaborative guidelines between the National Institute for Environmental Studies, Japan and Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), Indiaso as to carry out and implement joint research (hereinafter referred to as “Joint Research”) on air quality and climate change. Also, no such MoUs were signed by the ARIES, Nainital in the similar areas of research with any other foreign bodies in the past.
The following are some of the possible activities: –
a) Joint use and operation of scientific instruments
b) Exchange of scientific and technical information on observing methods
c) Joint analysis of observational data and making scientific reports
d) Joint educational and research activities.
e) Exchange of visiting scholars, including PhD students for the purpose of conducting research.
f) Joint scientific workshops and/or seminars
About ARIES:
Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES) is an Autonomous Research Institute established under the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India. ARIES is a centre of excellence for research in Astronomy & Astrophysics and Atmospheric Sciences. It carries out research on air pollution and climate change on earth, formation and evolution of sun, stars and galaxies. The research group of institute consists of research scientists, PhD students, postdocs and visiting scholars. The researchers are also involved in design and development of sophisticated and advanced scientific instruments and it is supported by a team of engineers and technical personnel who are involved in building and operating instruments at both the campuses – Manora Peak and Devasthal.
About NIES:
The National Institute for Environmental Studies (NIES) is Japan’s only research institute that undertakes a broad range of environmental research in an interdisciplinary and comprehensive manner. NIES works to produce scientific findings on environmental protection. NIES is working on research projects that include consolidating the institute’s research foundation through basic research, data acquisition and analysis, preservation and provision of environmental samples. NIES believes on four keywords (Synthesize, Integrate, Evolve, and Network = NIES strategies) to pursue environmental research, that is providing the maximization of Japan’s entire research and development results, for bridging the gap between the scientific community and society, as well as for the advancement of environmental policy in Japan and other countries.
The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has approved the transfer of 10 in-orbit communication satellites from Government of India (Gol) to M/s.NewSpace India Ltd. (NSIL), a wholly owned Public Sector Enterprise of GOI under the administrative control of the Department of Space.
The Union Cabinet has also approved increasing the authorized share capital of NSIL from Rs.1000 crore to Rs.7500 crore.
Transfer of these assets to NSIL will further provide the desired financial autonomy to the company to realize capital intensive programmes/ projects and thereby offering huge employment potential and technology spin-off to other sectors of the economy. This approval is expected to trigger domestic economic activity in space sector and increase India’s share in the global space market.
The Space Sector reforms mandated NSIL to undertake end-to-end commercial space activities and function as a full-fledged satellite operator. NSIL functioning as a single-window operator will also facilitate the ease of doing business in space sector. NSIL Board will now be empowered to price the transponders as per the market dynamics and global trends in the Satellite Communication sector. NSIL is also authorized to offer and allocate capacity as per its internal policies and guidelines.
