The minister called on academics to apply for more and more patents to cash in on the commercial value of such knowledge while benefiting society at large.
She was speaking at a convocation ceremony of the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research in Bhopal. “There are times when being the finance minister, it doesn’t give me motivation when I have to answer people about why our taxes are like this? Why can’t we even be lower than this?” she said.
“I wish I can bring it down to almost nil. But India’s challenges are severe and challenges will have to be overcome,” the finance minister said. She indicated that the requirement of resources is so dire that the government is constrained to keep taxes at certain level.
India, she said, is moving from fossil fuel to renewable energy on its own strength and using its own money. “If we cannot afford to wait for money which will come from somewhere else, we need to come out with innovation” that will enable the country to make the most out of the available resources, she said.
Seeking more patentsAs for patents, the minister said, “It is important for you (academics) to seek patents and enable your patented formulation to be commercialised and brought to the use of society. So it is important that we encourage science for science’s sake as much as science for society’s sake”.The government, she stressed, has heavily invested in scientific research. “The government is just not talking. It is putting money in R&D-money that is earned out of taxation,” she said.