Pariksha SaathiNITI Aayog launches the 'India S&T Scoreboard', an interactive platform on the science and technology landscape of States and UTs
NITI Aayog launched the 'India S&T Scoreboard' on 3 November 2026 at the Civil Services Officer's Institute (CSOI), KG Marg, New Delhi; it was unveiled by Ashok Kumar Lahiri, Vice Chairman, NITI Aayog. Developed as a key NITI Aayog initiative, the Scoreboard is an interactive platform that provides an integrated view of the science and technology landscape of Indian States and UTs, and is designed to facilitate evidence-based policymaking and benchmarking across States/UTs. It brings together data on the S&T ecosystem - higher education institutions, R&D institutions, deep tech startups and incubators - along with S&T outputs such as research publications and patents. Going beyond the volume of output, it presents indicators of research quality, impact, collaboration and open access across priority research areas and three sectors, namely Academia, Government R&D Labs and Industry; it also enables side-by-side comparison of States/UTs and provides detailed State profiles, including State policies and best practices. Prof. Abhay Karandikar, Member (S&T), NITI Aayog, said data on research and innovation had so far remained fragmented across multiple sources, making it difficult for States to assess where they stand, and that the Scoreboard addresses this gap by bringing ecosystem, publication and patent data together on a single interactive dashboard, with trends over years. Prof. Umesh V. Waghmare, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, said it adds a valuable State-level picture to the national evidence base on science and technology. The Vice Chairman said that, guided by the principle of cooperative and competitive federalism, the Scoreboard will help States identify their strengths and gaps, learn from one another and design better programmes and policies in science and technology, and urged all States and UTs to make full use of the platform, which is available at www.sts.niti.gov.in.
Drafted with AI assistance from the official PIB release linked above and checked against it by a second AI pass. Not line-edited by a human.
Learning context
On 21 July 2022, NITI Aayog released the third edition of its India Innovation Index - the India Innovation Index 2021 - prepared with the Institute for Competitiveness. PIB described the index as a comprehensive tool for the evaluation and development of the country's innovation ecosystem: it ranks the states and union territories on their innovation performance to build healthy competition amongst them. Karnataka topped the 'Major States' category again, Manipur led the 'North East and Hill States' category and Chandigarh was the top performer in the 'Union Territories and City States' category. Drawing on the framework of the Global Innovation Index, the number of indicators rose from 36 in the India Innovation Index 2020 to 66, distributed across 16 sub-pillars that in turn form seven key pillars: five 'Enabler' pillars measure inputs and two 'Performance' pillars measure output. The index was released by the then NITI Aayog Vice Chairman Suman Bery, and it contributes to the Global Indices to drive Reform and Growth (GIRG) mechanism, for which NITI Aayog is the nodal organisation.
Check yourself: which State topped the 'Major States' category of NITI Aayog's India Innovation Index 2021, and how many indicators did that edition use?
Karnataka; 66 indicators (up from 36 in the India Innovation Index 2020).
Revision task: from this release, note who launched the India S&T Scoreboard, where and on what date, who unveiled it, the data it brings together, the three sectors it covers, what it is meant to help States/UTs do and its web address; from the note, the edition of the India Innovation Index released in July 2022, the institute it was prepared with, the three category toppers and the numbers of indicators, sub-pillars and pillars. Compare what the two tools set out to measure.
Test yourself
Which body launched the 'India S&T Scoreboard', an interactive platform that provides an integrated view of the science and technology landscape of Indian States and UTs, in New Delhi on 3 November 2026?
Show the answer
Answer: NITI Aayog
NITI Aayog launched the Scoreboard, developed as a key NITI Aayog initiative, at the Civil Services Officer's Institute, New Delhi; it was unveiled by NITI Aayog Vice Chairman Ashok Kumar Lahiri. The Secretary of the Department of Science and Technology spoke at the launch, but the release credits the platform to NITI Aayog. The Scoreboard brings together data on the S&T ecosystem and on outputs such as research publications and patents, and enables side-by-side comparison of States/UTs.
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