DFG/DST - Indo-German International Research Training Groups
Deadline: 1. Februar 2023
In an effort to further strengthen the scientific cooperation between India and Germany, the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India (DST), and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) have agreed to extend their funding opportunities for joint research projects between both countries to the International Research Training Group (IRTG) programme and hereby invite applications under a joint application and funding scheme.
International Research Training Groups (IRTG), in which German universities cooperate with research institutions in other countries, combine innovative top-level research and the structured promotion of excellent early career researchers. As bilateral collaborations set up by experienced scientists, IRTG promote systematic scientific cooperation through joint research programmes and corresponding qualification measures for doctoral and postdoctoral researchers. A central feature of IRTG are coordinated and reciprocal research visits by doctoral researchers at the respective partner institutions. IRTG can only be established by universities and research institutions entitled to confer doctoral degrees.
Applications for Indo-German IRTG intended for DFG-DST funding are open to all subject areas covered by DST and interdisciplinarity in joint projects is encouraged. An IRTG should be run by two teams of participating researchers in India and Germany, respectively. Each team should have approximately five to ten members with proven expertise both in the IRTG’s main research topic and in providing outstanding supervision to doctoral students. The participating researchers’ expertise at the two locations should be complementary and provide added value to the IRTG. Each team of participating researchers in an IRTG should be based at a single institution in India and Germany, respectively. In convincingly justified cases, an IRTG may be based in more than two institutions.
The Indian and German teams in an IRTG should jointly formulate a high quality and coherent research and training programme to be implemented on both sides. The teams should have common research interests and objectives and these must be reflected in a common framework and joint project. Applications are submitted by the host institutions. For every IRTG, one member of the team on each side serves as spokesperson, being responsible for the proposal and the scientific coordination of the IRTG. This also includes responsibility for reporting to DST and DFG, respectively.
The programme should provide for regular exchanges of academic staff and doctoral students for the purposes of joint research and training. Doctoral students should spend a period of at least six months (and up to one year) in total during their PhD project at the respective partner institution for research and training and each doctoral student should have both an Indian and a German supervisor. On the German side, approximately ten to fifteen doctoral researchers will be funded within a single IRTG in parallel. The partner site in India should support a group of doctoral researchers of roughly the same size.
Both DST and DFG will provide funding for IRTG project-specific costs incurred by their respective partner institutions. In accordance with respective internal policies of DST and DFG, funds can be requested for the following activities:
- funding for PhD positions/fellowships up to 48 months per doctoral researcher,
- project-specific funding for dissertation research projects (e. g. consumables),
- longer-term, coordinated and reciprocal research visits (one or more with an overall duration of six to twelve months) by doctoral students to the respective partner institutions,
- joint workshops, conferences and seminars,
- short-term visits, lectures and workshops by the participating researchers.
