About ST Cell

Scheduled Tribe (ST) Cell is established by Science for Equity, Empowerment & Development (SEED) Division, Department of Science & Technology, Govt. of India through State Science & Technology Councils.

The Government of India has adopted a multi-pronged approach for the socio-economic development of the SC and ST communities: social empowerment through educational development; economic empowerment through income and employment enhancing avenues and integrated development of SC/ST majority villages; protection through effective implementation of protective legislations and holistic development through earmarking of funds for the welfare of Scheduled Castes.

Although the Government has been taking several steps and measures for the upliftment of SC and ST communities through community based developmental programmes like right to education, empowerment of rights, infrastructure development, creation of job opportunities, yet the efforts are not often enough sustainable. There is a dire need to address the vulnerability issues by taking into account the growing aspirations of the people and improved quality of life. Hence there is a need to develop and bring into practice innovative approaches towards creating opportunities for sustainable development. Therefore, there has been a focus on innovative S & T programmes directed towards addressing the basic day-to-day needs of the people through development of schemes/programmes that increase the adaptive capacity and resilience to emerging problems of livelihood. Under this ambit several scientific ministries/departments had developed various need based programmes for development of SC and ST communities through specific Science and Technology (S&T) interventions.