Vigyan Prasar is an autonomous organisation of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India. It works on the mission of providing and inculcating scientific temper in Indian society through continuous efforts to popularising science and technology with the Indian masses through all possible means of communication and outreach.
In the process, Vigyan Prasar has consistently delivered scores of knowledge products, reached out to millions of fellow citizens, and added value to a large number of national programmes. This includes opportunities to work closely with institutions and missions on health, agriculture, energy, water, sanitation, and fundamentals of science and technology including Engineering, Mathematics, Medicine, Agriculture and IT applications, with a special focus on overarching communication strategies. This emerges from the profound possibility that communication should be seen as a forerunner for training and capacity building, means/tool to reach the unreached, assess information and related needs & connect stakeholders across institutions. These holistic and systemic interventions help establish and consolidate the niche science communication truly represents.
Here are a few most prominent and overreaching initiatives of Vigyan Prasar:
India Science
India Science is the country’s first and dedicated OTT Science Channel with the unique distinction of producing 4000+ science movies in 3.5 years. This 24x7 video platform is dedicated to science and technology knowledge dissemination, with a strong commitment to spreading scientific awareness, especially with Indian perspectives, ethos, and cultural milieu. It covers the entire landscape of Science & Technology including Engineering, Health and Medicine, Natural Science, Environment and Wildlife, Children’s Curiosity, Science and Society, Agriculture, Innovations, Scientific Heritage, and Science Policy using interactive and latest formats like Documentaries, Discussion, Demonstrations/Experiment Shows, Quizzes, Game shows, Science Fiction, Docu-Dramas, Specials, Biographies
Publications
The Publication Programme of Vigyan Prasar delivers popular science books and newsletters aligned with Vigyan Prasar’s science popularization goals. Vigyan Prasar has consistently published books on various themes/issues of topical relevance. The authors are renowned scientists and science communicators from all across our country. These publications are used by several grass-root institutions including State S&T Councils, Room to Read, and Science Centres. Almost all the titles of Vigyan Prasar are available in the digital library on the VP website. All the books published by Vigyan Prasar are available for online reading. Visit the Digital Library of Vigyan Prasar and register for free. You can download complete books for future reading. You can also place an order to Buy Book Online.
India Science Wire
The news service is dedicated to developments in Indian research institutions, universities, and academic institutions. Almost all news stories released by this service are based on research papers by Indian scientists published in leading Indian and foreign journals. All news stories and features are written and edited by a team of professional science journalists with decades of experience in science journalism. News stories based on happenings in Indian research laboratories and academic institutions are released to media houses on a daily basis. These stories are also uploaded on the website of India Science Wire and are simultaneously promoted through social media – Twitter and Facebook.
VIPNET Clubs
VIgyan Prasar NETwork (VIPNET) is an initiative started with the objective of providing a fillip to the science clubs movement in India. This is a network to weave all science clubs, societies, organisations that are already established or are going to be established to strengthen the popular science movement in the country with far-reaching implications for the development of society. So far, VP has 3500 registered clubs
ISTI Portal
India Science, Technology & Innovation (ISTI) Portal is a centralised repository of the content generated related to science, technology and innovation within the Indian STI ecosystem with a significant thrust on reaching out to students, scientists, researchers, youth and the general public to help them choose fellowships, scholarships, funding, and startup opportunities in India. Currently, ISTI Portal hosts 92000+ unique records of scientific information. The lifeline of the Portal is its more than a million visitors annually who utilises the information and get benefitted from them.
The Portal is a user-friendly destination with repositories of ongoing and recently completed research projects, developed technologies, recognised innovations, funding opportunities, fellowships & scholarships, organisations, academia-industry partnerships, etc. The Portal also provides information about the programmes and schemes the government of India offers to boost scientific activities and the ways in which India's government is fostering innovations. It projects India's STI policies, regulations, & vision through various documents developed by the government's numerous science ministries and departments, like S&T Roadmaps, STI policy documents, S&T indicators and S&T investments. It also has information on people carrying out the research, agencies involved in funding, international collaborations, organisations working in STI space, and so on.
Science Communication, Popularisation and Extension (SCoPE)
Vigyan Prasar has started an initiative on mission mode, entitled as Science Communication, Popularisation and Extension (SCoPE) with the objective of carrying out science popularisation activities in Indian regional languages (in the mother tongue) in various States of the country. The SCoPE activities have been going on in several languages including Tamil, Kannada, Hindi, Marathi, Bengali, Maithili, Assamese, Telugu, etc.