The Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF) is a statutory body established by the Anusandhan National Research Foundation Act, 2023, which received Presidential assent on August 12, 2023 and came into force on February 5, 2024. It functions as the apex institution under the Department of Science and Technology (DST) to provide high-level strategic direction for research, innovation, and entrepreneurship across India.
The concept originated from the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, which proposed an autonomous funding agency to address the structural problem of asymmetric research funding, where approximately 90% of central R&D funds historically went to a few premier institutions. The ANRF aims to democratize research funding and foster a culture of research and innovation in all universities and colleges, particularly those with nascent research capacity.
The Act establishes the ANRF as a body corporate with perpetual succession and mandates it to guide, fund, promote, and monitor research across a broad spectrum, including natural sciences, engineering, health, agriculture, and the scientific interfaces of humanities and social sciences. A key mechanism is its financing model, which targets a corpus of ₹50,000 crore over five years (2023–2028), with the majority of the funding, approximately ₹36,000 crore, intended to be mobilized from non-governmental sources like industry and philanthropy. The Foundation is governed by a Governing Board chaired ex-officio by the Prime Minister of India, with the Union Ministers of Science and Technology and Education serving as Vice-Presidents.
The ANRF replaces and dissolves the Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB), which was established under the Science and Engineering Research Board Act, 2008. The ANRF Act, 2023, repeals the 2008 Act and subsumes SERB's functions, assets, and programs into the new Foundation. This change broadens the scope of the apex research body from SERB's concentration on science and engineering to a much wider, interdisciplinary mandate. The ANRF also connects to the proposed ₹1 lakh crore Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) Fund, which is intended to catalyze private sector investment in sunrise and strategic sectors.