Mr. Mahesh Patel

Mr. Mahesh Patel is one of the senior-most scientists with more than 3 decades of experience towards nurturing innovation - driven enterprises and strengthening India’s grassroots innovation ecosystem. His work remains dedicated to promoting science, technology, and innovation-based solutions which address real-world challenges while creating pathways for innovators to translate their ideas into viable enterprises.

A significant part of his career has been devoted to supporting innovative ideas emerging from students and grassroots innovators across the country. By facilitating value addition, intellectual property protection, and industry linkages, he has played a pivotal role in transforming promising ideas into impactful enterprises. His value addition and mentoring abilities have translated seemingly many tiny ideas into scalable technological solutions and thereby helped many innovators connect with industry He has remained instrumental in executing the Innovation In-Scholar In-Residence programme of the Rashtrapati Bhawan which has directly contributed towards elevating exposure of grassroots and student innovators. Many economically successful grassroots innovators of today (Turnover to the tune of few crores and above) were mentored him as early as the year 2000 and are now run by subsequent generations of those grassroots innovators which reflect a measurable sustainable dimension of his work.

He played a key leadership role in implementing the INSPIRE–MANAK (Million Minds Augmenting National Aspirations and Knowledge) programme, a flagship initiative of the Government of India aligned with the vision of Startup’s India. Under his leadership and guidance, the programme has strengthened the national innovation pipeline by identifying young talent at an early stage and providing them with opportunities for mentorship, development, and further advancement in the innovation ecosystem.

Currently, he serves as the Head of the Impact Assessment and Public Policy Division and Programme Planning and Management Division, where he provides strategic direction for key national initiatives aimed at promoting innovation, entrepreneurship, and inclusive development. In this role, he oversees study design for impact assessment, implementation, and evaluation to ensure that initiatives generate measurable social and economic impact and implantation of new institutional program of NIF-India. His work focuses on assessing the effectiveness of innovation and entrepreneurship programmes, generating policy insights, and supporting evidence-based decision-making for strengthening India’s science, technology, and innovation landscape.