Policy in 7-8 days to promote private sector R&D in railways

The Indian Railways will come up with a policy in the next 7-8 days to make private-sector research and development a major part of the railway budget with 90 per cent allocation in the future, Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said Wednesday.

While speaking in the concluding session of a post-Budget webinar on technology-enabled development, the railway minister said the defence and space sector has already broken the silos by opening up research and development (R&D) for the private sector and the same needs to be done in other sectors as well.

“We are starting something in the Railways soon. In another 7-8 days, we will launch a new policy where private sector R&D would become an integral part or rather major part of railways R&D budget.

“We do hope that going forward, probably 90 per cent of railways R&D budget would be in the private sector compared with 100 per cent in the public sector,” Vaishnaw said.

Vaishnaw, who handles the telecom and IT ministry, appreciated industry suggestions on spectrum. “Thought process on the use of spectrum is changing. For a long period, spectrum was viewed as a revenue-generating resource. The last 2 years have shown a good element of spectrum,’’ he said. (PTI)