It has been reported that India is eyeing a slew of measures, including fiscal incentives and stricter regulations, as part of the framework being firmed up to encourage a circular economy. Extended producer liability in 11 sectors or products and a refund option for products after use besides some other fiscal sops could be introduced to aid the switch to circular economy from a linear one. The 11 sectors include scrap metal (ferrous and non-ferrous), lithium ion (Li-ion) batteries, tyre and rubber recycling, gypsum, end-of-life vehicles (ELVs), electronic waste, toxic and hazardous industrial waste, municipal solid waste and liquid waste, agriculture waste, used oil waste (generated from tools and machines) and solar panels, the company said.

A National Intellectual Property Awareness Mission (NIPAM) under the initiative of the Government's "Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav", has been launched by Shri Anurag Jain, Secretary, DPIIT on 8/12/2021. The pan-India ambitious mission aims to provide awareness on intellectual property and its rights to 1 million students. It aims to inculcate the spirit of creativity and innovation to students of higher education (classes 8 to 12) and ignite and inspire the students at college/Universities to innovate and protect their creations. During the launch, Govt. emphasized the importance of the role of a strong IPR ecosystem in the advancement of a country and how IPR is an important tool for the IP holder to become a "Job giver rather than job seeker".

Ministry of Electronics and Information technology (MEITY) released “National Strategy on Blockchain” with the vision to create trusted digital platforms through shared Blockchain infrastructure; promoting research and development, innovation, technology and application development; and facilitating state of the art, transparent, secure and trusted digital service delivery to citizens and businesses.

This strategy document lays out overall vision towards development and implementation strategies for a National Blockchain Platform covering the technology stack, legal and regulatory framework, standards development, collaboration, human resource development and potential use cases. It is envisaged that this strategy document would provide the necessary guidance and support for realizing the vision and creating a nationwide ecosystem for creating the National Blockchain Platform and development of relevant applications using this platform in various domains. Download>>

• Telecommunications Standards Development Society, India (TSDSI) have released a technical report titled “Smartphone User Data & Privacy Protection” Read more/Download>>

• MEITY launched its AI compendium’ 75@75 India’s AI journey”. This was done in collaboration with NeGD and NASSCOM. The compendium highlights the 75 use cases of AI in India that have successfully impacted the people and the governance of the nation. The use cases have been categorized under government, startups, academia, and enterprises. Read more/Download>>

The center notified the semiconductor policy that aims to promote the manufacturing of semiconductor chips in the country. As per the notification, the government will provide up to 50% of the cost for setting up two semiconductors and two display fabs units. The Application window will start from 1 January and will be open for 45 days. “The government may extend the benefits of Modified Electronics Manufacturing Clusters (EMC 2.0) Scheme… Up to 2.5% of the outlay of the scheme shall be earmarked for meeting the R&D, skill development and training requirements for the development of semiconductor… Semiconductor Fab(s) set up in India will be supported through purchase preference in procurement of electronic products by the Government under the Public Procurement (Preference to Make in India) Order 2017,” reads the notification.  The Centre is planning to give incentives of Rs 76,000 crore to set up over 20 semiconductor companies, components manufacturing and display fabrication units in the next six years to make India an electronics market.“