In order to discuss the relevance of Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) in the Indian context, RIS (Research and Innovation System in developing countries), in collaboration with the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India, organized a half-day national consultation on ‘Responsible Research and Innovation’, on April 28, 2017 at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. The consultation included two panel discussions on: RRI in Indian policy and ‘Aspects and Elements of RRI’. While the former was chaired by Prof Prabhat Ranjan from TIFAC, the latter was chaired by Dr Rajesh Tandon, UNESCO Co-Chair. The consultation was attended by various policy representatives from DST, DBT, Niti Aayog; senior research scientists from NISTADS, ICAR, JNU, NLU etc..
Dr Tandon spoke about ‘social responsibility’ in the field of science and technology; and how the sector can pursue meaningful and mutually beneficial community engagement for achieving social responsibility objectives. A very important aspect of this process was scientists valuing the traditional knowledge among communities, as being at par with their academic expertise. In the context of UN SDGs, Dr Tandon re-iterated the important role, science has to play in fulfilling the objectives; for it was only the ‘new knowledge’ created by the coming together of worlds of research and practice; that can help address the challenges of current times.
