India reacts to Wisner’s threat

NEW DELHI, MAY 21: Reacting to United States Ambassador Frank Wisner's criticism of India's patent regime, the scientific establishment tod...

NEW DELHI, MAY 21: Reacting to United States Ambassador Frank Wisner’s criticism of India’s patent regime, the scientific establishment today asserted that India “scrupulously meets its international obligations”.India sees science and technology as an integral part of the global community’s activity in the service of mankind, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research said in a statement issued here.

Though the CSIR’s statement did not make a specific reference to the US envoy, it was evident that the statement issued today was prompted by Wisner’s remarks at yesterday’s meeting of the Indo-US Joint sub-commission.

Addressing Indian scientists on the opening day of the sub-commission, Wisner had warned that cooperation between Indian and American scientists could be jeopardised unless India tightened its intellectual property rights (IPR) regime.

Story continues below this ad

What has incensed the scientific community is the direct threat in Wisner’s remark that until India gets an “equitable” IPR distribution and protection regime in place, the US would be “unable to negotiate a formal science and technology agreement and some area of research and training will be closed to cooperation”.

The CSIR statement emphasised that Indian science is “open and friendly in the richest of Indian traditions and culture” and this had led to a large number of “success stories” resulting from international collaborations.India “scrupulously meets its international obligations as fully vindicated by a large number of success stories emanating from collaborations and it is imperative therefore for it to expect other countries not to impose an extra legal restriction on cooperation”, the statement said.

BJP spokesman Yashwant Sinha said today that the party did not approve of the “language of threat” used by the US.