{"id":36609,"date":"2023-07-30T08:50:49","date_gmt":"2023-07-30T03:20:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=36609"},"modified":"2025-04-21T23:21:35","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T17:51:35","slug":"government-e-marketplace-gem-scientists-hampered-by-dearth-of-quality-research-equipment-in-gem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/government-e-marketplace-gem-scientists-hampered-by-dearth-of-quality-research-equipment-in-gem\/","title":{"rendered":"Government e-Marketplace (GeM): Scientists hampered by dearth of quality research equipment in GeM"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>What is the Government e-Marketplace (GeM)?<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>What are the Features of GeM?<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Significance of the GeM Portal<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>News Summary Regarding Issues Faced by the Scientific Community on GeM<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Why in News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>While the Ministry of S&amp;T has announced its intent to galvanise research in India through the National Research Foundation Bill 2023, scientists say that the mandatory procurement via GeM is a major stumbling block.<\/li>\n<li>This is impeding the sourcing of equipment and materials necessary for research.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2><strong>What is the Government e-Marketplace (GeM)?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>It is an online platform<\/strong> for public procurement, launched in <strong>2016 <\/strong>by the <strong>Ministry of Commerce and Industry (MoC&amp;I)<\/strong>, Government of India.<\/li>\n<li>It was created with the <strong>objective to create an open and transparent procurement platform<\/strong> for government buyers to facilitate the online procurement of goods and services.<\/li>\n<li>The purchases through GeM by Government users have been authorised and made <strong>mandatory <\/strong>by the <strong>Ministry of Finance under<\/strong> the General Financial Rules, 2017.<\/li>\n<li>The platform is owned by<strong> GeM SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle)<\/strong> which is a <strong>100% Government-owned, non-profit company<\/strong> under the MoC&amp;I.<\/li>\n<li>The portal features over 11,000 product categories with more than 29 lakh listed products, as well as over 270 service categories with more than 2.5 lakh service offerings.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<h2><strong>What are the Features of GeM?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>GeM is a completely <strong>paperless, cashless and system driven e-market place<\/strong> that enables procurement of common use goods and services with minimal human interface, thus, brings in <strong>transparency<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>Being an open platform, GeM offers <strong>no entry barriers to bonafide suppliers<\/strong> who wish to do business with the Government.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Seamless processes and online time-bound payment<\/strong> has given confidence to the vendors and reduced their <strong>&#8216;administrative&#8217; cost<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\u25cf \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/lh6.googleusercontent.com\/1SygKhk3IkowggAYHDw9o0RUa4yACL8ehzpkTjJVVFX0o2ZCV5TbHnGIkMrGsRCOfkjNjqjPtcj9KqSyNdnHvTv4DTL8Fl31C5FFbmUo1KGcMfEGfaND0U0xwE_vzLmrjwTjdyKVzM1DSk3hoSW42Zs\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Significance of the GeM Portal:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>The minimum savings<\/strong> on the platform are about 10%, which translates into a savings of over \u20b9 30,000 crore worth of public money.<\/li>\n<li><strong>GeM gives Indian MSMEs <\/strong>a relative advantage over foreign suppliers of products, and promotes the government\u2019s Make in India initiative.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>News Summary Regarding Issues Faced by the Scientific Community on GeM:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>While the GeM has been in force since 2017, <strong>scientific organisations were exempt from the mandate until 2019.<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>This meant they could continue to invite bids<\/strong> after setting out requirements, or reach out to known suppliers.<\/li>\n<li>This often means several parts or chemicals must be <strong>available at the right time<\/strong>. However, <strong>this entire process can take months.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>After 2019<\/strong>, products ranging in cost from \u20b95 lakh to \u20b9200 crore must be procured via India-registered companies, which are often of <strong>substandard <\/strong>quality.\n<ul>\n<li>Much of the equipment that is necessary for research falls into this price band and needs to be sourced internationally.<\/li>\n<li>This became a problem during COVID-19, and the government exempted about 2,000 products.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Insistence on a centralised procurement system, <strong>only created a new ecosystem of contractors and vendors<\/strong>, rather than actually encouraging the desired Atmanirbharta (self-reliance).<\/li>\n<li>An early draft of the proposed National Research Foundation Bill <strong>suggested that the GeM no longer be mandatory for scientists.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Scientists should be made accountable for the science they do and not be burdened with ensuring that their equipment is procured at the lowest cost.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3><strong>Q1) Why is the National Research Foundation (NRF) Bill 2023 drafted?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>The NRF Bill 2023 seeks to establish NRF, an apex body to provide high-level strategic direction of scientific research in the country as per recommendations of the National Education Policy (NEP), at a total estimated cost of Rs. 50,000 crore during five years (2023-28).<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n<h3><strong>Q2) Why was the Make in India initiative launched?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<p>&#8216;Make in India&#8217; initiative was launched in September 2014 as a part of India&#8217;s renewed focus on Manufacturing. The objective of the Initiative is to promote India as the most preferred global manufacturing destination.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Source:<\/strong>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thehindu.com\/news\/national\/in-the-governments-e-marketplace-scientists-get-a-rough-ride\/article67134562.ece\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><strong><u>Scientists hampered by dearth of quality research equipment in GeM<\/u><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>GeM an online platform for public procurement, launched in 2016 by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":36610,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-36609","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}