The Govt has put up an act - the National Innovation Act 2008 for comments and suggestions.

A content analysis of the students of XIMB can be found here.

The draft Act provides a special window for low cost technologies: “The Appropriate Government shall take special measures for supporting public, private or public-private initiatives, which facilitate and encourage Innovation, including in low cost technologies, products and services for the benefit of the common man whether in urban or rural India”. Excluding this para, the whole draft essentially deals with providing incentives for research by public and private sector and ensuring confidentiality rights of the innovators, individuals and firms through contractual or noncontractual exchanges. The Act also provides for the fiscal incentives for those who invest in technologies and those who set up facilities in the innovation park or special innovation zones.

The new draft Act provides specific concessions for the formal sector but assures only a consideration for the informal sector. In this dichotomy of concessions and considerations, the destiny of the grassroots innovators and traditional knowledge holders will be desgined there is a need for a very radical departure from this draft if the NIA has to truly reflect the aspirations of the creative and innovative majority of the country.

-- Anil Gupta, National Innovation Foundation in the editorial of Agony in Diversity: Honey Bee, Vol19(2) April-June 2008