India's call for closer BRICS research cooperation at the August 21, 2026 ministerial meeting in Chennai developed into an agreement on shared facilities, research information and project funding. In his opening address, Jitendra Singh proposed deeper collaboration on infrastructure, researcher mobility, financing and startup partnerships.
The Chennai Consensus, adopted that day and published by South Africa's science department, welcomed work towards the BRICS Global Research Advanced Infrastructure Network, known as GRAIN. It invited countries to update national research-infrastructure databases and an access survey in accordance with their laws and policies. It also recorded discussion of a joint coordination committee and subject-specific GRAIN centres.
The declaration identified practical research subjects as well as institutional arrangements. Ocean and polar cooperation included coastal-city resilience, contributions to the Global Ocean Observation system, a joint polar-ocean biodiversity study and participation in Antarctic expeditions. It also encouraged joint quantum-technology projects following the June 7-8 BRICS forum and its joint statement.
India's August 22 account added detail about the proposed Science and Research Repository. Its draft framework would map institutions, researchers, publications and other outputs, datasets, infrastructure and collaboration opportunities. The repository is envisaged as a shared information resource, subject to national regulation and data-governance requirements.
The Indian account also set out the entrepreneurship agenda: closer engagement among incubators, accelerators and early-stage investors, mobility for young innovators and access to relevant markets. It described a Youth Startup Platform and consideration of a Startup Innovation Fund under the industry ministers' track, with science-and-technology coordination where appropriate.
Financing existing research competitions had a separate timetable. The declaration welcomed the April 2026 multilateral-project and pilot flagship-project calls under the BRICS STI Framework Programme, with an October meeting planned to finalise results. It scheduled the Young Scientist Forum and Young Innovator Prize for November 2-6, placing researcher exchanges alongside the project-selection process.
