New Delhi (Sputnik) — With the aim of providing a common platform for joint scientific and entrepreneurial efforts by school students from India and Russia, the two countries are set to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that will facilitate collaboration in the field of science and technology between India's Atal Innovation Mission and Russia's Creative School, SIRIUS. The MoU will be signed during a bilateral annual summit in New Delhi on Friday led by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Named after former Indian Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the Atal Innovation Mission (AIM) is a flagship initiative school set up by India's policy think tank NITI Aayog to promote innovation and entrepreneurship among future generations.
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In a conversation with Sputnik, R. Ramanan, Mission Director, AIM, said that the MoU that is to be signed on Friday, will provide the much-needed thrust to extend the ongoing collaboration between AIM and SIRIUS so that the promotion and exchange of best practices in new-age innovation and entrepreneurship continues in the future as well.
Sputnik: Tell us something about the ongoing workshop at IIT, Delhi.
R. Ramanan: The Russian and Indian students are collaborating to create innovations in specific areas such as space technology, agriculture, clean energy, mobility etc. They also have a group of mentors collaborating with them and guiding them before their innovations.
They aim to provide actual solutions to the real world problems through their innovations.
Sputnik: What is the basic objective Atal Innovation Mission?
These do it yourself kits are made available to the school students so they can tinker with them and create innovations and get familiar with the latest technologies.
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Sputnik: How will the MoU with SIRIUS help AIM in its mission?
R. Ramanan: This is going to be a long-term collaboration for the exchange of innovations between India and Russia.
The prime minister of India had visited the SIRIUS and he was very impressed by what he saw. The idea is to create a series of such innovation interaction.
These projects will be completed, they will be showcased to the leaders of India and Russia, but the collaboration will continue further. The whole idea is how do you stimulate problem-solving innovative mindset in school students and how do you bring the talent of both the countries; converge to address the problems of India; and the problems that the world faces.