At a Roundtable meeting organized on April 5 by the Canada India Foundation (CIF), Canada's Minister of Industry, Hon. Tony Clement emphasized the Conservative Party's objective of reintroducing the India engagement initiatives presented at the last budget.
Speaking to the Board of Governors of CIF, representatives of other leading Indo-Canadian organizations such as Indo-Canada Chamber of Commerce and IIT Alumni Assciation as well as Ontario Chamber of Commerce, Asia Pacific Foundation, University of Waterloo and other experts on Canada-India relations, Minister Clement affirmed his party's resolve to conclude the Canada India Free Trade Agreement by the year 2013, if returned to to form the next government. He commended Canada India Foundation highly for playing a major role in the strengthening of relations between Canada and India and looked forward to its continued leadership in this important area of Canada's public policy for engagement with India.
Mr. Clement devoted a major part of his discussion to the $12 million Canada Excellence Research Chair (CERC) program, focused on India, and announced in the last budget. The program would be a follow-up to the previous highly successful CERC program, whose objective was to bring the best research minds of the world to come to Canada and conduct their innovative research for groundbreaking results. The program, which was administered through a competitive process and peer review of applicants, provided for 20 research chairs of $10 million each. This "Brain Gain" for Canada had caused major European and American newspapers to accuse Canada of taking away their countries' best researchers, Mr. Clement said.
The success of the program had encouraged the government to create additional CERC programs. The seed for an India focused CERC program had been planted during Prime Minister Harper's visit to India in 2009. The importance given by India's Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to innovation, expressed in discussions during his visit to Canada last year, gave a further impetus to Canada to create a Canada-India Excellence Research Chair. The $12 million grant, to be provided over 5 years, would be given to a single winning academic institution, based on a thorough competitive process and peer review. He expressed the hope that the winning institution would be willing to collaborate with other institutions to maximize the available innovative talent. This program would come under the purview of the Ministry of Industry, which he currently heads.
Aditya Jha, National Convenor, Canada India Foundation, said that all Indo-Canadian organizations such as those present at the Roundtable should share the credit for advancing the India profile for the betterment of Canada. He highlighted CIF's own initiative in working with University of Waterloo to set up an India Policy Centre, enabled by a generous contribution from CIF Charter Member Vasu Chanchlani and offered CIF's support in formulating and implementing the CERC-India program.
Speaking to reporters after the Roundtable and at the subsequent reception, Minister Clement was highly complimentary of CIF in organizing the meeting and all the Roundtable participants for their valuable feedback. He looked forward to continuing to work with CIF and others in giving shape to the CERC-India program and in implementing it successfully.
Ramesh Chotai, Chair, Canada India Foundation, said that CIF will be meeting the other leading political parties to discuss their respective India engagement strategies over the next coming weeks preceding the election.
