Needed: An ecosystem to nurture ingenuity

Last week, an Indian start-up, Chakr Innovation, unveiled a device that uses ozone to clean the pores of N95 masks, allowing each mask to be reused 10 times after decontamination. This week, I advised a young woman wanting to deploy foot-operated hand-washing stations in busy markets. The pandemic is fostering innovation — technological, financial and behavioural. Policy must accelerate it.

India is drafting a new Science, Technology and Innovation Policy (STIP2020). Since Independence only four S&T policies/resolutions have been published, in 1958, 1983, 2003, and 2013. The current crisis makes it clear that S&T cannot be ivory tower preoccupations. Innovation