India climbed four spots to rank 48th by the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) in the Global Innovation Index 2020 rankings. During the COVID -19 pandemic, this comes as encouraging news for the country and is an endorsement of its robust research & development (R&D) ecosystem.
The country will now strive to be in the top 25 in the WIPO rankings.
India was at the 52nd position in 2019 and was ranked 81st in the year 2015. Therefore, is a remarkable achievement to be in the league of 50 highly innovative nations globally. WIPO had also accepted India as one of the leading innovation achievers of 2019 in the central and southern Asian region, as it has shown a consistent improvement in ranking in the last five years.
The consistent improvement in the global innovation index rankings is owing to the immense knowledge capital, the vibrant start-up ecosystem, and the work done by the public and private research organisations. The scientific ministries like the Department of Science and Technology, Department of Biotechnology and Department of Space have played a pivotal role in enriching the national innovation ecosystem.
The Central Government's think-tank NITI Aayog has been working to ensure optimisation of national efforts in this direction by bringing policy led innovation in different areas such as electric vehicles (EVs), biotechnology, nanotechnology, space exploration and alternative energy sources.
The India Innovation Index, which was released last year by NITI Aayog, has been widely accepted as the major step in the direction of decentralisation of innovation across all the states of India. A constant thrust in monitoring and evaluating India’s position in global rankings have been provided by NITI Aayog, including the global innovation index.
“India must aim high and double its efforts in improving its ranking in the global innovation index. The call for Aatmanirbhar Bharat by the Hon’ble Prime Minister could only be realised if India punches above its weight class and compete with global superpowers in developing scientific interventions. It is time that India brings a paradigm shift and aims to be in the top 25 countries in the next global innovation index rankings,” a NITI Aayog spokesperson said in an official statement following the announcement.