Patna: Recent govt initiatives and sustained efforts of voluntary organisations are serving to to nurture scientific temper amongst Bihar’s youth. In flip, the youthful era is striving to carry laurels to the state by way of their scientific and technological improvements. Bihar, as soon as celebrated for its pioneering works in arithmetic, astronomy and science in the course of the Maurya and Gupta empires — contributions that included insights into the Earth’s rotation, the causes of eclipses, the calculation of pi and the invention of zero — is witnessing a revival as a hub of scientific studying. Institutions such because the State Council of Education, Research and Training (SCERT), the division of science, expertise and technical Education, the Bihar Council on Science and Technology (BCST) and the National Council of Science Museums are rolling out programmes to encourage scientific curiosity amongst college students. Among essentially the most energetic is Science for Society (SFS), Bihar, a voluntary organisation of scientists, technologists and science communicators that has labored since 1980 to popularise science. As the nodal company of the National Council for Science and Technology Communication, a wing of the Centre’s division of science and expertise, SFS efficiently organised the Children’s Science Congress from 1993 to 2023 in collaboration with SCERT and BCST. This congress gave kids aged between 10 and 17 a chance to suppose scientifically and translate their concepts into working fashions. Explaining the method, SFS president Arun Kumar stated, “Children work in teams under a guide on an identified theme. They select a problem from the neighbourhood, develop a hypothesis and conduct field research, see patterns in data and prepare a report and finally present their findings before a peer group in their own language. Meritorious and innovative projects are selected from the district level congress to the state level congress and finally to the national convention. More than 10,000 children of the state participate in this activity every year.” Kumar added that since 2024, the state-level congress is being organised because the Bihar Children’s Research Programme. BCST has additionally been offering funding for analysis, supporting establishments and selling innovation with an emphasis on native options. Meanwhile, the Bihar Education Project Council (BEPC) has directed govt faculties to kind science and arithmetic golf equipment to encourage scholar curiosity in scientific actions. Such golf equipment now exist in greater than 75,000 faculties. Other initiatives are reaching deeper into rural areas. Organisations resembling Mantra4Change are working to bridge the gaps in STEM schooling whereas Atal Tinkering Laboratories (ATLs), established beneath the Atal Innovation Mission of NITI Aayog, are fostering creativity and experimentation. “Hundreds of schools in Bihar have operational ATLs,” stated a senior official of the schooling division. In Patna, Kilkari Bal Bhawan has been specializing in creativity and scientific temperament by way of kids’s science gala’s, workshops and project-based studying. “We aim to make science interesting and accessible, especially for underprivileged children,” stated its director, Jyoti Parihar. Annual occasions too are reinforcing this spirit. Maker’s Mela, held in districts together with Bhagalpur and Bhojpur, has given kids a platform to showcase initiatives and domesticate scientific pondering. Another effort, ‘Anveshika’, coordinated by IIT Kanpur beneath Padma Shri recipient H C Verma, is growing revolutionary and low-cost physics experiments to unfold hands-on science studying. “Thousands of students of different colleges in the state have been trained in experimental physics over the years,” stated Rakesh Kumar Singh, head of Aryabhatta Knowledge University’s nano science and nano expertise division. The older era of lecturers believes such efforts should go additional. Former principal of Patna Science College, Atul Aditya Pandey, stated, “For creating further interest in science, children should be encouraged to develop a habit of keen observation of various phenomena taking place in their immediate surroundings and think critically. The school labs should be modernised with necessary equipment so that children take interest in hands-on learning. Children should also be motivated to use scientific methods and rational inquiry to address pressing social problems like healthcare, water quality and natural resources’ conservation.”