ANNUAL REPORT - Department of Biotechnology

per year for a period of three years. The scheme has
a provision to give upto ten awards every year
subject to availability of suitable candidates. For the
career development awards for 2006, 63
nominations have been received and 7 scientists
have been selected.
National Women Bioscientist Award
Department has instituted three National Women
Bioscientist awards every year to encourage and
recognise significant research contributions of
women bioscientists. Senior Women Bioscientist
Award is given to a senior women scientist for life
time contributions, excellent research and
application for the benefit of the society. The award
carries Rs. 1 lakh along with citation and a gold
medal. Two young women scientists below the age of
45 years are awarded Young Women Bioscientist
Award for pursuing a brilliant research career in
biology. Contributions made in the last 5 years are
considered mainly to select candidates for award.
The awards carry cash amount of Rs.50,000/- along
with citation and gold medal. During 2006-07, 14
nominations under senior category and 29
nominations under young category have been
received. For the national women bioscientist award
for 2006, 1 woman scientist under senior category
and 2 women scientists under young category have
been selected.
Biology Scholarships
Twenty-five biology scholarships are awarded to top
students in Biology/Biotechnology at the CBSE 10 +2
level examination. This scholarship is awarded to
encourage them to take up Biology as a career. Each
scholarship carries a cash amount of Rs.15,000/-, a
gold plated medal and a certificate of merit. The
awards are presented at the National Science Day
th
function held on 28 February every year. From
2006-07, 2 candidates from each state board will
also be given DBT biology scholarship.
Innovative Young Biotechnologist Award (IYBA) :
Background
The Department of Biotechnology has launched a
award namely Innovative Young Biotechnologist
Award (IYBA) during the year 2005. The purpose of
this scheme is to recognize potential young
biotechnologist and promote them to carry out
research in hardcore biotechnology subject with
Innovative ideas. Through this award the scientists
those are not working on regular basis will be getting
a fellowship of Rs. 25000/- per month and grants-inaid
of Rs. 30.00 lakhs for a period of 3 years to be
investigated a specific innovative project. The
candidate those are in the regular employment will
receive an amount of Rs. 1.00 lakh as cash award per
annum and grants-in-aid for a period of 3 year.
IYBA 2005
For the IYBA Award 2005, a total of 69 applications
were received from various parts of the country
based on wide advertisement in various means in
which 42 applications were found eligible, meeting
the minimum criteria. The review of these proposals
was carried out through online with IYBA expert
committee members. Out of 42 eligible applications,
15 were short-listed and they were invited for
presentation before the IYBA expert committee.
Finally 4 candidates were awarded during the year
2005. The following are those awardees.
1) Dr. Amita Gupta, Delhi University, South
Campus, New Delhi
2) Dr. Samir Vishwanath Sawant, NBRI,
Lucknow
3) Dr. D. Sundar, Pondicherry University,
Pondicherry.
4) Dr. Gitanjali Yadav, NCPGR, New Delhi
IYBA 2006
For the IYBA 2006, the Department has received a
total of 82 applications which are under online pear
review. Once after this, the IYBA selection
committee will select suitable candidate for this
award and likely the number of awards can be
increased upto 25 this year.
23 Human Resource Development