Also, we need to give importance to value systems to promote innovation. We need to develop an ecosystem of innovation and technology will arrive soon. Of the 140 nations rated for innovation, India stood at a lowly 66. We need new ways of doing things and new ways of thinking. We cannot be doing the same things. Jugaad (a temporary solution) is one of them. The atmosphere itself should encourage innovation.

I feel the Indian industry should contribute to help the government towards scientific research. The government alone can't do it. As of now, there's nothing. I have been into research for about 40 years. In the US, 50 to 60 per cent of the research and development (R&D) cost would be covered by the industry. There is a need for the same here and the industry needs to do it. Earlier, the industry in India didn't feel the need to do research. They could sell anything. Now, it wants to compete with the likes of South Korea and Japan, but they can't. We need to change this or the industry can't compete.

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Prof Rao said he visited the Nobel prize-winning scientist’s (C.V.Raman} laboratory in Bengaluru first as an 11 year-old school boy. “He was the first to recognize my interest in science and has given me a lot of encouragement. He made me a member of the Indian Academy of Sciences when I was only 30. I can never be equal to him.

I feel basic science is getting its due now. I used to say earlier that Dr Homi Bhabha should get this honour and also some other eminent researchers. Scientists work very, very had but rarely get recognition. I have been working for 62 years. I was 17 when I started my research. I am going to be 80 soon.

Since I set up the Unit, the area of solid state chemistry is no longer called so but is called chemistry of materials.This subject has become important. I set up this Unit in Bangalore much before the subject became important in the world. Now chemistry has two major directions:chemical biology and materials chemistry.

Fifty years is a very long period. The first 30–35 years – we could call this period as one when India equipped itself to face important problems. For example, we built institutions such as the IITs and the National Laboratories...We need much better infrastructure facilities and we must work on more difficult problems. Unfortunately, we have been used to working on problems that are somewhat repetitive. If we want to be at the cutting edge, we have to be innovators and originators.

I have been working in the area of solid state chemistry for nearly four decades. When I first got seriously interested in the subject in the early 1950s it was still in in infancy. Very few chemists , let alone others, recognized solid state chemistry as an integral part of the main-stream chemistry . In spite of such benign tolerance, solid state chemistry has gradually emerged to become a crucial component of modern solid state and material science.