The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) has announced the launch of a new scheme to offer research fellowships for scientist in the country who has crossed 70 years of age.

The scheme was announced to mark its 70 foundation day. The scheme will offer Rs. 20 lakh a year for five years to scientists if they remain active, guide students and publish research papers during the period of time. The scheme will only be available to those who are not getting any kind of support. About 5 to 10 scientists are likely to be eligible for the new scheme.

CSIR Director-General Samir Brahmachari pointed out that several scientists remain active even after the cross the age of 70 years and the centre is aiming to take advantage of their services to the scientific community and reward them for their work.

Meanwhile, Dr. Brahmachari also announced the names of the winner of the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar award 2012. The list of winners include Shantanu Chowdhury of the CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Suman Kumar Dhar of the Jawaharlal Nehru University in Biological Sciences, Govindasamy Mugesh of the Indian Institute of Science, Gangadhar J. Sanjayan of the CSIR-National Chemical Laboratory for Chemical Sciences, Ravi Shankar Narayanan of the Indian Institute of Science and Shanti Pavan of the IIT, Madras forEngineering Sciences.

Siva Ramachandran Athreya and Debashish Goswami of the Indian Statistical Institute (Mathematical Sciences), Sandip Basu of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (Medical Sciences), Arindam Ghosh of the Indian Institute of Science and Krishendu Sengupta of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (Physical Sciences) were also awarded for their work in their respective fields.