Call for Proposals

Through research and innovation, the ANRF MAHA Leapfrog Demonstrators for Societal Innovation in India program aims to spur creative, integrative, and scalable solutions to India's most urgent societal concerns.
India's problems necessitate answers that go beyond incremental improvement; these solutions must be meaningful, reach the people who need them most, and provide a viable route to widespread adoption. This Call for Proposals (CFP) supports Leapfrog Demonstrations—integrated, research-driven demonstrators that validate transformative technical, economic, and/or social hypotheses at meaningful scale, in line with the national mandate to concentrate on India-centric problems and globally competitive solutions. In this context, "leapfrog demonstrators" are projects that show how state-of-the-art research speeds up the transfer of creative solutions from development phases to scalable, high-impact deployment. 

Elegibility Criteria 

Each proposal must be submitted by a Lead Institution, headed by a Lead Principal Investigator (PI). The Lead PI-
1. Must hold a regular position at: Academic institutions / National Research Laboratories (NRLs). Lead PI can also be from Recognized not-for-profit Research Institutions / Section 8 companies whose object clause is aligned with program goals.
2. Must Be Indian citizen or OCI holder.
3. Must Hold a Ph.D. in Science, Engineering, Mathematics, relevant Social Sciences, or M.D./M.S./M.D.S./M.V.Sc.
4. PIs from academic institutions / NRLs and nearing superannuation, may apply with a Co-PI having at least 5 years of service remaining. INSPIRE, Ramanujan, and Ramalingaswamy Fellows, may participate as Co-PIs.