Govt announces Rashtriya Vigyan Puraskar honouring scientific achievements

New Delhi: India’s scientific community received a resounding tribute last week with the announcement of the Rashtriya Vigyan Puraskar (RVP) 2025 list, honouring 24 distinguished scientists and one pioneering research team for transformative contributions across diverse domains.

Building on the inaugural edition, the awards underscore the Union government’s vision of ‘Viksit Bharat’ through Vigyan, a developed India powered by scientific temper and innovation.

At the apex stands the Vigyan Ratna, the nation’s highest civilian honour in science and technology, instituted in 2023 and first conferred in 2024 upon Dr. Govindarajan Padmanabhan, the eminent biochemist whose decades-long work on the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum illuminated drug resistance mechanisms and inspired global anti-malarial strategies.

Conferred annually on National Space Day which is celebrated on August 23, it mirrors the prestige of the Bharat Ratna but is dedicated solely to lifetime scientific excellence.

Complementing this pinnacle are three other categories.

Eight senior researchers received the Vigyan Shri for sustained impact in fields ranging from quantum materials to sustainable agriculture.

Fourteen early- and mid-career innovators, all under 45, were named Vigyan Yuva-Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar awardees, a reimagining of the iconic SS Bhatnagar Prize to nurture India’s next generation of scientific leaders.

The sole Vigyan Team award went to the CSIR Aroma Mission, a multi-institutional consortium that has revitalised aromatic crop cultivation across 60,000 hectares, empowering more than 50,000 farmers in 26 states with high-yielding lavender, rosemary, and lemongrass varieties, generating Rs 1,200 crore in rural revenue since 2017.

The 2025 cohort reflects India’s widening scientific footprint.

Among the Vigyan Shri recipients are a climate modeller whose AI-driven monsoon forecasts have reduced crop losses by 18 per cent in Odisha, and a materials scientist whose biodegradable polymer from agricultural waste is now scaling for medical implants.

The Yuva awardees include a 38-year-old astrophysicist decoding fast radio bursts at Pune’s Giant Metrewave Radio Telescope and a 41-year-old biotechnologist engineering salt-tolerant rice strains already under field trials in coastal Tamil Nadu.

Launched in 2023 to replace 16 fragmented science awards, the RVP scheme streamlines recognition under a single, transparent framework.

Nominations are vetted by a 300-member search-cum-selection committee chaired by the Principal Scientific Adviser to Union government, Ajay Kumar Sood, ensuring peer-driven meritocracy.

Unlike earlier prizes, RVP carries no cash component, instead offering a sanad, citation, and a medal cast in panchdhatu, symbolising unity of five classical elements.

The awards will be presented by President Droupadi Murmu at a Rashtrapati Bhavan ceremony on National Science Day on February 28, 2026.

As India targets a $1 trillion research economy by 2047, the RVP not only celebrates past breakthroughs but signals a national resolve to place science at the heart of development.

IANS