Shri S. K. Sarangi, Secretary MNRE gave the Keynote Address
at the Industry Day event, “Empowering India’s Solar
Future,” organized by NCPRE at IIT Bombay on November 8,
2025. In his address, Shri Sarangi described the remarkable
achievements made by India in Solar Energy in the last
decade, and also touched upon the ambitious plans for the
coming years, including 1800 GW of renewable energy by
2047. The Secretary also requested the industry leaders to
collaborate and interact with the R&D personnel in the area
of solar energy at IIT Bombay. Dr. Sangita Kasture, R&D
Advisor at MNRE, mentioned the state-of-the-art facilities
set up by MNRE at NCPRE. The Director of IIT Bombay, Prof.
Shireesh Kedare, welcomed the Secretary and Dr. Kasture to
the campus, and said that IITB has been working in solar
energy for many years. He exhorted industry to take
advantage of the expertise present. Prof. B. G. Fernandes, PI
of NCPRE, gave an overview of the activities and
developments at NCPRE, including the launch of 3 spin-off
companies. The Secretary then officially launched the
newest of these companies, ART-PV India, in the presence of
its founder Prof. Dinesh Kabra. He also inaugurated the
latest generation module simulator, the Passan Model
HighLIGHT SMT Lab 4.8. The Secretary also took the
opportunity to visit several of the NCPRE laboratories.
The Industry Day event had 3 themed panel discussions,
“Solar Deployment and Manufacturing” moderated by Prof.
Narendra Shiradkar, “Next-Gen PV: Breakthroughs in
Materials and Efficiency” moderated by Prof. Dinesh Kabra,
and “Integrating Solar into Grids: Challenges and Solutions”
moderated by Prof. Kishore Chatterjee.
During the
afternoon session, mechanisms for collaboration between
industry and IIT Bombay were discussed in detail, led by the
Dean (R&D), Prof. Sachin Patwardhan. Over 100 participants
from many solar companies were present at the event.
Among the participants at the event were Shri
Subrahmanyam Pulipaka, CEO of the National Solar Energy
Federation of India (NSEFI). Solar companies whose leaders
were present included Waaree Energies, First Solar,
ReNewsys, Grew Energy, NTPC Green Energy, Tata Power,
Grid India, Anvia Technologies, RSOLEC, Holtec Asia, Reliance
Industries, Selec Controls and India Energy Storage Alliance.
(Top) At the Inaugural Session: (L to R) Prof. Sachin Patwardhan, Dr. Sangita Kasture, Shri S. K. Sarangi, Prof. Shireesh Kedare and Prof. B. G. Fernandes. (Bottom) Secretary Sarangi and Dr. Kasture visiting the Perovskite-Silicon Tandem Laboratory with Prof. Dinesh Kabra and his team.