BACKGROUND NOTE ON NATIONAL GEOSCIENCE AWARDS
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BACKGROUND NOTE ON NATIONAL GEOSCIENCE AWARDS
Introduction In the year 1966 the Ministry of Mines, Government of India instituted the National Mineral Awards scheme with the objective of honouring and recognising individual and teams of scientists for their extraordinary achievements, outstanding contributions in the field of fundamental or applied geosciences, mining and allied areas at the National Level. The awards are given annually. Over a period of time, the scheme of National Mineral Awards has grown with inclusion of more disciplines and enhancement of the Award money. A National Mineral Award for Excellence was instituted in the year 1996 for Lifetime Achievement in the field of Geosciences. To encourage excellence in young minds, a “Young Researcher Award” was introduced in 2009 which has been rechristened as “Young Scientist Award” in 2013. The National Mineral Awards scheme was enlarged into a National Geoscience Awards (NGA) scheme from the year 2009 onwards to foster further research in Geosciences. In the last decade the award money has been raised thrice. Now the National Geoscience Award for Excellence carries an award money of Rs 5,00,000/- , National Geoscience Awards carry an award money of Rs.3,00,000/- each and the award money for Young Scientist Award is Rs. 1,00,000/-.
2. Invitation of Nominations for Award Each year for invitation of nominations for the awards, the regulation booklets governing National Geoscience Awards are posted in the website of Ministry of Mines, UGC & CSIR in the first quarter of the year. Sometimes, newspaper advertisements are also published in National as well as Regional dailies throughout the country. D.O. letters from Joint Secretary, Ministry of Mines are also written in this regard, to the heads of the sponsoring organizations like Central Government Ministries; all India scientific/professional/academic societies; national level academic and research institutions; universities/ deemed universities/autonomous academic institutions; all state governments; central and state government public sector undertakings and also to the former recipients of the award of excellence. Sufficient time is given the applicants and sponsoring agencies for submitting nominations for National Geoscience Awards.
3. Categories of National Geosciences Awards Each year National Geoscience Awards are given under three categories: · National Geoscience Award for Excellence – One Award. · National Geoscience Awards – Nineteen Awards. · Young Scientist Award – One Award.
The category (II) i.e. National Geoscience Awards has four sections which are subdivided into fourteen fields. The details are given below:
Section- I: Mineral Discovery & Exploration: Fields: · Mineral Discovery & Exploration (excluding fossil fuels) of economic and/or strategic importance and application of innovative techniques (2 Awards) · Coal, Lignite and Coal Bed Methane Discovery & Exploration of economic and/or strategic importance and application of innovative techniques (1 Awards) · Oil, Natural Gas and Gas Hydrates Discovery & Exploration (including project development and planning leading to exploitation of resources and reservoir management) (1 Award) · Groundwater Exploration (including project development, hydrogeological studies and management of groundwater resources) (1 Award)
SECTION-II: Mining, Mineral Beneficiation and Sustainable Mineral Development Fields:
· Mining Technology (including development and application of new methods and technologies, research & development, conservation of mineral resources, systematic mine planning, mine safety, mine fires, mine hazards, mine reclamation and rehabilitation) (2 Awards) · Mineral Beneficiation (including mineral processing, project development and planning leading to utilization of low grade ores & production of value added mineral products and mineral economics) (1 Award) · Sustainable Mineral Development (including mine closure, project development, outstanding contribution to institutional development and capacity building) (1 Award)
SECTION-III: Basic Geosciences Fields: · Basic Geo- Sciences (including Stratigraphy, Structural Geology, Paleontology, Geomorphology, Economic Geology, Geodynamics, Petrology and Geochemistry, Mineralogy, Geochronology and Isotope Geology (2 Awards)
SECTION-IV: Applied Geosciences Fields: Fields: · Applied Geology : Engineering Geology, Geothermal Energy, Seismotectonics, Geostatistics, Photogeology and Remote Sensing and Geo- information System (including spatial data management applications and data integration (2 Awards) · Geophysics / Applied Geophysics : New technologies in geophysical exploration, application of geophysical methods, geo-magnetism, geophysical survey techniques and instrumentation (2 Awards) · Geo-Environmental Studies relating to mining, urban, industrial, coastal and desert management, paleoclimate, paleoenvironment, medical geology, climate change and studies related to their impact on ecosystem (1 Award) · Disaster Management including scientific studies related to natural hazards such as earthquakes, landslides, floods and tsunami (1 Award) · Ocean Development : Oceanography and Marine Geology (1 Award) · Glaciology and Arctic & Antarctic Research including Geo-Scientific Expeditions (1 Award) 4. Selection Procedure for the Award For each year’s awards four Sectional Scrutiny Committees (SECTION – I : Mineral Discovery & Exploration; SECTION-II : Mining, Mineral Beneficiation and Sustainable Mineral Development; SECTION-III : Basic Geosciences; SECTION-IV : Applied Geosciences) and one Screening Committee of Experts are constituted with the approval of the Chairman of the Award Making Authority (Secretary, Ministry of Mines). Each Sectional Scrutiny Committee evaluates and scrutinizes the nominations field wise and shortlist the candidates for the awards. The recommendations of each Sectional Scrutiny Committee are reviewed by the Screening Committee of Experts, which next recommends to the Award Making Authority for the selection of the awardees. The Screening Committee of experts also evaluates the nominations for making recommendations for the Award for Excellence and Young Scientist Award to the Award Making Authority. The members of the above committees are drawn from reputed experts available in the country. Following broad criteria are followed during selection of the experts. · Unbiased image and overall standing of experts. · Eminence of experts in the designated field/sub-field and noteworthy contributions & achievements made. · Selection of experts from the Govt. Institutions/Public Sector Undertakings/renowned academic institutions/Private Sector. · Recipients of Awards of national/international standing such as National Geoscience Award/Award for Excellence/Shanti Swaroop Bhatnagar Award etc. · Record of meritorious services rendered and positions held in past. · Selected experts are from the field of the nominees, however, care is taken that they do not belong to institute/organization of the nominees. · Experts who were involved in the previous year selection are not considered for the present year i.e. NGA-2014 experts were not considered for NGA-2016. The composition of various selection committees, proceedings of the meetings and the procedure for consideration of the nominations are kept confidential, so that the candidates nominated for the awards are not able to influence the procedure of selection. Further, the compositions of the Committees are not intimated to the other members of the committees till they meet for the meeting. This is done to prevent the possibility of pre-decision on the suitability of the nominees by a group of committee members through mutual interactions.
Final selections for each year’s Awards are made by the Award Making Authority. Composition of the Award Making Authority is as follow:
5. Evaluation Criteria for the selection of the Awardees i. Award for Excellence (single award) is given to an outstanding geo-scientist / engineer / technologist / academician with an exceptionally high lifetime achievement for a sustained and significant contribution in any of the disciplines mentioned in Regulations of National Geoscience Awards.
ii. National Geoscience Awards (nineteen awards) are given to geoscientists / engineers / technologists / academicians individually or to team(s) in recognition of their meritorious contribution in any of the disciplines as mentioned in para 3 (Categories of National Geosciences Awards), above.
iii. Young Scientist Award (single award) is given for outstanding research work in any field of geoscience to Researchers / Scientists from Universities, Academic and Professional Institutions and who are below 35 years of age on the 31st December of the Year of Award.
iv. Any citizen of India who is a professionally qualified geo-scientist/ engineer/ technologist/ academician having meritorious background with significant contribution in any of the fields specified in Regulations is eligible for the Awards and Award for Excellence.
v. The award is given on the basis of contributions made through work done for most part in India during the past ten years preceding the year of the award.
vi. The academic excellence and honors/awards conferred earlier upon the nominees are considered.
vii. Assessment of the candidates’ 10 most significant publications in national/international journals during last five years.
viii. Recommendations of the sponsoring authority about relevance of candidate’s significant contributions.
ix. The work carried out by the nominee and the application of innovative approach/technique/development of a new technique/refinement of the existing technique, new discovery made/new methods developed application of multiple techniques in problem solving/R&D/mineral discovery-assessment of overall economic impact/increase in productivity. Assessment of the impact on contribution in widening horizons of geo-scientific knowledge and its applications are also considered.
6. Presentation Ceremony Presentation of the National Geoscience Awards is made at an Award Presentation Ceremony on a date and time as decided by the Chief Guest of the Award Ceremony and the Chairman of the Award Making Authority.
7. Award & Award Money · The Award for Excellence carries a cash prize of Rs. 5,00,000/- and a certificate. · In the category of National Geoscience Awards each Award carries a cash prize of Rs. 3,00,000/- and a certificate · The Young Scientist Award carries a cash prize of Rs. 1,00,000/-and a certificate.
8. The Past Awardees Till NGA-2014, numbers of awardees under different categories are as follows:
Eleven eminent Geoscientists in their respective fields have been conferred upon with the National Geoscience Award for Excellence. 1. Prof. V. K. Gaur (1996) 2. Padma Bhushan Prof. K.S. Valdiya (1997) 3. Padma Shri Late B.P. Radhakrishna (2000) 4. Padma Shri Dr. Hari Narain (2001) 5. Padma Shri Dr. Harsh K. Gupta(2002) 6. Dr. S.M. Naqvi (2006) 7. Prof. Sisir Kumar Sen (2008) 8. Prof. Ashok Sahni (2009) 9. Prof. C. Leelanandam (2010) 10. Prof. I.B. Singh (2013) 11. Prof. Ashok Kumar Singvhi (2014)
9. NGA-2016 Awards This year 27 geoscientists have been selected for the awards.
NATIONAL GEOSCIENCE AWARDS – 2016
LIST OF AWARDEES
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