Cabinet to decide on Media Lab Asia soon

Government on Monday said the future course of action in the case of Media Lab Asia, the joint venture between IT department and MIT of US, ...

Government on Monday said the future course of action in the case of Media Lab Asia, the joint venture between IT department and MIT of US, would be decided by the Cabinet while ruling out closing down the research project. ‘‘The draft Cabinet paper has already been prepared by the department and I hope the Cabinet would find time to deliberate on it soon’’, Arun Shourie, Minister for IT and Communications said here. He, however, said Media Lab Asia is certainly not being shut but it would be restructured in every way. ‘‘Whether it is going to be exclusive relationship with MIT or anybody, how much private funding is going to be available, greater participation in decision-making for people who will be doing or directing the research, the staff of media lab Asia, there would be restructuring in all these areas, ’’, he said.

Maruti IPO in June first week: Shourie

NEW DELHI: The initial public offer (IPO) of MUL will hit markets in the first week of June, Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie said. ‘‘The prospectus has been filed with Sebi. So, I am confident that we would be able to approach the markets in the first week of June,’’ he said. The public issue would be for sale of government’s 25 per cent stake in Maruti, in which Japanese auto maker SMC has 54.2 per cent stake. The IPO’s draft prospectus was filed with Sebi on April 25.

IT and Communications Minister Arun Shourie has said that an advanced institute for micro and nano electronics would be set up to give a boost to the hardware industry in the country. Scientific advisor to the Government of India R. Chidambaram will help the IT department (DIT) in choosing the venue, faculty and manner of running the proposed institute, Nano and micro technology refers to the development of small, micro chips, with higher computing power to be used in electronics products like computers and mobile phones. While asking the domestic IT industry to move up the value chain, Shourie said there should be closer links between the R&D Sector, industry and the academia. Stressing the need to develop the hardware sector, he said the budget has given good sops to the hardware units and it is up to them now to respond with results.

Earlier this month, the IT department in its revised plan, had stated it was considering a move to make it purely a government-aided R&D outfit. DIT has suggested that research and collaborative agreement (RCA), which formed the basis of the project, would be dropped and a project-specific agreement would be in place.