Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Thursday that it was time for research to expand beyond the Central institutes of national importance — such as the IITs and the IISERs — and branch out into the numerous State universities.

Observing that “95% of our students go to State universities and colleges,” he said: “We must have a strong research ecosystem in these places.”

Mr. Modi, who was addressing an audience of students, researchers and Nobel laureates at the 106th edition of the Indian Science Congress here, called on the Prime Minister’s Science, Technology and Innovation Advisory Council to formulate a plan to implement such a scheme.

The Prime Minister, whose arrival was delayed by two hours owing to fog, urged scientists to work on ways to boost productivity for small farmers, most of whom had inadequate-sized landholdings.

“The majority of farmers possess less than 2 hectares of land, we need more technology to improve their productivity,” he added.

The Prime Minister said 2018 had been a “good year” for science in India. “We are among the top 5 countries in terms of research publications, according to SCOPUS [an international database of research papers],” he said.

“Building on Lal Bahadur Shastri’s motto of ‘Jai Jawan, Jai Kisan’ the late PM A.B. Vajpayee added ‘Jai Vigyan.’ Today, we can add ‘Jai Anusandhan’ [research],” Mr. Modi remarked.

India must also focus on innovation and start-ups, the Prime Minister said. Noting that the government had introduced the Atal Innovation Mission to promote innovation among the country’s scientists, he asserted that more technology business incubators had been established in the last four years than in the preceding 40 years.

The key achievements of Indian science this year, he said, were: the production of aviation grade biofuel; Divya Nayan — a reading machine for the visually impaired; devices for the diagnosis of cervical cancer, TB and dengue; and a real-time landslide warning system in the Sikkim-Darjeeling region.