Section 2

Contract research comprises all research activities undertaken through specific contractual arrangements agreed upon between the parties for the purpose. Contract research may be undertaken for advancement of science or for resource generation. The contracting parties could be public or private e.g. universities for a specific job for short-term and long-term benefits.
Contract research would normally be undertaken with private organisations, provided these fall within the mandated areas of the Institute.
The Contract research will broadly cover the following three types of projects:

i. Sponsored Projects:
These projects would be entirely funded by the client having specified research objectives, and well defined expected project outputs/ results. Such projects may be multi-client also, with more than one sponsor sharing the project funding and research results.

ii. Collaborative Projects:
Collaborative projects involve partial/ full funding by the client or may be supplemented by provision of inputs such as expert manpower, production/ fabrication of product in bulk for testing/ trials, infrastructural facilities, etc. Such projects may be for upscaling/ improving of laboratory level knowhow, variety development and evaluation, technology/ product/ process development etc. Like Sponsored projects, the Collaborative projects will also have well defined project outputs/results.

iii. Grant-in-aid Projects:
These projects involve grant by way of financial inputs, either in full or in part, assistance in kind, e.g. equipments, training etc. to supplement the institutional efforts in ongoing or new research projects or for creating new capabilities/ facilities. Such projects are normally undertaken for supporting strategic or exploratory research, or for maintaining large/ nationally important R&D programmes or for developing infrastructural facilities.
The funds for grants can generally be sought from government departments/ organisations or international organisations. However, well established industrial and business houses may also provide such grant-in-aid.