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Key Highlights In 2016-17, some 12,442 patent applications filed and 9,194 (74%) are from foreigners

At 46,904, the highest number of applications were filed in 2015-16, and 33,846 (72%) by foreigners

Situation was the same in the two years that preceded: In 2013-14, some 74% of patent-seekers were foreigners, and in 2014-15, about 72%

Bengaluru: Seven out of 10 patents in India are filed by foreigners or foreign entities. A total of 1.45 lakh patents were filed between 2013 and 2016, according to the information submitted to the science and technology ministry.

Of these, 1.05 lakh — or 73% of them — were filed by foreign natural persons (inventors and applicants) and other foreign applicants (legal entities or organizations). Indian inventors or other Indians account for 27% or 39,318 patents, according to the Controller General Patents Designs and Trademarks.

Scientists said the underwhelming Indian numbers are because of a lack of excitement in the community. Good work is appreciated only after it comes to light, they said.

Bharat Ratna Prof CNR Rao, who is pro-research and favours an increase in fund for science, had said in March: “Researchers are relaxing with too many furniture. Little sheds are enough to do research, (but) many facilities have pampered researchers. It doesn’t matter which government is in power, it is time India starts getting the results (based on research) out.”

Rao said serious research needs to be conducted in newer areas, and the focus needn’t be only on infrastructure.

Former Isro chairman UR Rao cited two issues on the subject: “One, there is not enough work that is patentable. Two, our institutes are not equipped to manage inventions and patents like some outside this country do.”

He continued: “In the 1960s when I was a researcher at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), on a random day, three people met me in the lab and said, ‘We understand you have developed a new technology. MIT thinks it is patentable.’ We do not have this culture.”

As per data till December 2015, nearly 86% of the total patent applications filed in the country are pending. On an average, it takes five years for an applicant to obtain patents in the country. In sensitive areas like pharmaceuticals or biochemistry, experts say, technologies or inventions become obsolete in that time.

