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India’s R&D spending crosses 0.8% of GDP, private sector leads
India's research and development spending reached 0.83% of GDP in 2021-22, the first time it has crossed the 0.8% mark since 2009-10. The Department of Science and Technology disclosed the figures in…
The Story in Brief
India's research and development spending reached 0.83% of GDP in 2021-22, the first time it has crossed the 0.8% mark since 2009-10. The Department of Science and Technology disclosed the figures in a Lok Sabha reply on Wednesday, part of the unpublished Research & Development Statistics 2025-26. Private industry contributed 51.8% of national R&D spending in 2023-24, the first time businesses outspent all levels of government combined.
Gross Expenditure on R&D jumped 53% to Rs 1.95 lakh crore in 2021-22 from Rs 1.27 lakh crore in 2020-21, a COVID-year slump. It rose further to Rs 2.13 lakh crore in 2022-23 and Rs 2.45 lakh crore in 2023-24. Industry R&D spending nearly doubled from Rs 46,400 crore in 2020-21 to Rs 88,600 crore in 2021-22. The shift comes as India's R&D-to-GDP ratio had steadily fallen to 0.64% in 2020-21, compared with 2.4% for China and 3.5% for the US.
The Indian Opinion
The jump from 0.64% to 0.83% is welcome, but the real story is industry finally pulling its weight. For years, government blamed low private R&D for India's poor showing. Now that business is spending more than the state, the test is whether this translates into original innovation or remains incremental development for the domestic market. Watch the share of basic research in next year's statistics to judge depth.
Source: thehindu.com
This story was synthesised by AI from the source linked above.
