Indo German Co-operation

The MoU also covers areas of border protection, aviation security, cyber crime, illegal migration and counterfeit currency. Under the umbrella of this MoU, there will be exchange of information, technological expertise and cooperation on basic and advanced training of security. The Joint Declaration of Intent on Cooperation in the field of Disaster Management seeks to deepen and develop cooperation in the field of Disaster Management through exchange of information, processing technologies and other Scientific/Technological expertise in the field of Disaster Management, as well as providing training and capacity building of First Responders in Civil Defence, urban search and rescue, Fire services and medical field. Shri Rijiju also expressed hope that Germany will overcome its reluctance on inking the bilateral Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) which will pave the way for the deportation of criminals.

At the meeting held before the 3^rd Indo-German Consultative meeting, both the Ministers expressed their satisfaction on the level of Indo-German Science & Technology cooperation which is now recognised as one of the strategic pillars in the overall bilateral relationship.

 

It was reiterated by both sides that they would continue to support and strengthen the basic research component of collaboration which will underpin future technology developments.

 

India is investing approximately 14 million euro for the construction of an additional beam line and access to the synchrotron facility at PETRA-III in DESY at Hamburg. Similarly, India is equity share holder with investment of 36 million euro in the construction of the international “Facility for Antiproton-Ion Research” (FAIR) at Darmstadt. Both these state of art facilities will further enable our scientists to conduct high impact and frontier research in material science, nuclear and high energy physics. On the same model, Dr. Harsh Vardhan offered Germany to participate in some of the future mega science projects, which India will be embarking upon.

 

 

A major highlight of the meeting was the agreement on both sides to extend the bi-national Indo-German Science & Technology Center (IGSTC) beyond 2017 with increase in funding from 2 million euro to 4 million euro every year. This was a reflection of the common endeavour on both sides to support industrially relevant R&D projects that have potential to generate novel technologies and new intellectual property in sectors such as advance manufacturing, embedded systems & ICT for automobiles, renewable energy, food security, clean water and health care technologies- all of which are in tune with present national missions of the government of India. India is the only country with whom Germany has such a bilateral R&D Centre dedicated to promote applied and industrial R&D. The Centre is already supporting 15 joint projects and pro-types of some new technologies have been co-developed in solar-thermal energy, stress tolerant chic-pea variety, and high altitude cold resistance plants etc.

 

Dr. Harsh Vardhan expressed confidence that the extended tenure of Indo-German Science & Technology Centre (IGSTC) until 2022 along with doubling its financial resources will enable us to co-develop affordable technologies that can contribute to the knowledge economy of both our countries. PIB