SERB - POWER Research Grants

What are SERB-POWER Research Grants?

SERB-POWER Research Grants are a research-funding scheme for women scientists, run under the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF) of the Department of Science and Technology. POWER stands for Promoting Opportunities for Women in Exploratory Research. The programme was launched to reduce gender disparity in science and engineering research funding and to give women scientists in India structured, dedicated support for leading their own research projects.

The scheme was originally launched by the Science and Engineering Research Board (SERB). SERB has since been subsumed into ANRF, so the POWER grants now operate under ANRF while the older serb.gov.in pages continue to carry the scheme details. There are two connected components under the POWER umbrella: the POWER Fellowship for individual women scientists, and the POWER Research Grants covered here, which fund a research project led by a woman Principal Investigator.

According to the SERB-POWER programme, the aim is to ensure equal access and weighted opportunities for Indian women scientists who often face structural barriers in securing competitive research funding.

How much do SERB-POWER Research Grants provide?

The grants are offered at two levels:

• Level I, funding of up to Rs 60 lakh for three years.
• Level II; funding of up to Rs 30 lakh for three years.

The level applicable to a proposal depends on the seniority of the woman Principal Investigator and the type of host institution, as set out in the SERB-POWER guidelines. The grant is a project grant, not a personal allowance. It covers research costs such as project staff, equipment, consumables, travel and overheads, and is released to the host institution against an approved proposal and its budget.

Who is eligible for a SERB-POWER Research Grant?

You can apply if:

• You are a woman scientist and an Indian citizen.
• You hold a regular research or faculty position in a recognised Indian academic institution, national laboratory or research institution.
• Your proposal is endorsed and forwarded by your host institution.
• Faculty recruited through the UGC Faculty Recharge Programme, and INSPIRE Faculty, Ramanujan and Ramalingaswamy Fellows, may apply provided they have sufficient tenure remaining, as specified in the guidelines.

Any Co-Principal Investigator must also be a woman from the same institute. A male Co-PI is not allowed under this women-focused scheme.

You cannot apply if:

• You are male — the grant is exclusively for women Principal Investigators.
• You already hold a POWER Fellowship, a woman scientist cannot hold a POWER Fellowship and a POWER Grant at the same time.
• You are a J.C. Bose fellow, or a Principal Investigator who has already completed two Core Research Grant (CRG) projects.
• You are an individual seeking a personal cash benefit, this is a research project grant routed through an institution, not a scholarship or stipend.

Can an individual apply for a personal benefit?

No. SERB-POWER Research Grants are competitive research grants, not an individual welfare benefit. There is no direct-benefit-transfer payment to a citizen. A woman scientist applies with a specific research proposal, the proposal is peer-reviewed, and if selected the funds are sanctioned to her host institution to run the project. Readers looking for a personal scholarship or fellowship stipend should look instead at the POWER Fellowship or at student scholarship schemes.

What documents are required?

How to apply for a SERB-POWER Research Grant

1. Check the ANRF/SERB portal (serb.gov.in) for an open call for proposals under SERB-POWER Research Grants, as applications are accepted only during an active call.
2. Register on the online proposal portal as a Principal Investigator.
3. Prepare the research proposal, objectives, methodology, expected outcomes and a detailed three-year budget, in the required format, and add your biodata and publication list.
4. Ensure any Co-PI is a woman from your institute, and obtain the endorsement of your host institution.
5. Submit the proposal online before the call closes; the institution forwards it for peer review and evaluation by ANRF.

Where to get help

The scheme is administered by the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (which absorbed SERB) under the Ministry of Science and Technology. Scheme details, the current guidelines and open calls are published on serb.gov.in/page/serb_power and the ANRF online portal. Because funding levels and eligibility conditions are periodically revised, always confirm the current figures and the open-call timeline on the official ANRF/SERB pages before applying.

How to check your application status

SERB-POWER Research Grants do not have a status-tracking dashboard for the general public the way a citizen welfare scheme does, because proposals move through peer review over several months rather than a fixed disbursal cycle. Even so, there are real ways to track where a submitted proposal stands.

• Login to the ANRF/SERB online proposal portal used at the time of submission, with the same credentials created during registration. Most SERB proposal systems show a proposal reference number and a status field (such as "under review," "sent for expert comments," or "recommended") against each submitted application once it moves past the initial screening.
• Check your registered email regularly. ANRF/SERB communicates most decisions, requests for revision, and requests for a presentation or interaction with the expert committee by email to the Principal Investigator and, in parallel, to the nodal officer of the host institution.
• Go through your institution's research or sponsored-projects cell. Because every SERB-POWER proposal is forwarded and endorsed by the host institution, the institution's research office is copied on major correspondence and can often confirm status faster than an individual applicant.
• Contact ANRF/SERB directly through the contact channel listed on serb.gov.in if a proposal has been pending well beyond the timeline mentioned in that year's call for proposals, quoting the proposal reference number, the call name, and the Principal Investigator's name.
• Watch for a formal sanction letter rather than an informal confirmation as the final proof of approval; only a sanction letter or sanction order from ANRF/SERB confirms a grant has actually been approved and funds are being released to the host institution.

Because the process runs in discrete calls for proposals rather than a rolling online tracker, applicants should expect the wait between submission and a decision to run into several months, and should treat "no update yet" as normal rather than assume a proposal has been lost, unless the call's own stated timeline has clearly passed.

Common reasons for rejection

• Proposal submitted outside an open call window. SERB-POWER accepts research proposals only while a specific call for proposals is active on the portal; a proposal prepared and ready but submitted after the call closes is not considered. The fix is to track serb.gov.in for the next call announcement and submit well before the stated deadline, not on the last day.
• Missing or delayed institutional endorsement. Because the host institution must forward and formally endorse the proposal, a submission that reaches ANRF without this endorsement, or with it added after the deadline, is treated as incomplete. Applicants should route the proposal through their institution's research cell early enough for signatures and internal approval before the closing date.
• Ineligible or incorrectly structured Co-Principal Investigator. A male Co-PI, or a Co-PI from a different institute where the guidelines require the same institute, results in the proposal being found non-compliant at the screening stage itself. Confirm the Co-PI is a woman scientist from the applicant's own institution before finalising the team.
• Applicant already holds a POWER Fellowship, or has completed two Core Research Grant projects, or is a J.C. Bose fellow. These are explicit exclusions under the scheme; proposals from applicants in any of these categories are screened out regardless of the quality of the research idea. Check current eligibility against these conditions before investing time in a proposal.
• Weak or unclear budget justification. A three-year budget that does not clearly break down staff, equipment, consumables and other costs against the stated objectives is a common reason expert reviewers send back or reject a proposal at the technical evaluation stage. Each budget head should be tied explicitly to a specific research activity in the proposal.
• Proposal judged not sufficiently novel or exploratory in peer review. SERB-POWER funds exploratory research, so a proposal that closely repeats the applicant's existing funded work, or lacks a clear scientific gap it addresses, can lose out to competing proposals in the same call even when the applicant is otherwise eligible. Reviewing recent literature and clearly stating the specific gap the project fills strengthens this part of the proposal.
• Incomplete biodata or publication record submitted in the wrong format. Since track record is assessed alongside the proposal, an incomplete CV, missing publication list, or biodata not filed in the format the portal specifies can weaken an otherwise eligible application at the screening stage. Filling every required field on the portal's biodata template, rather than attaching a personal CV format, avoids this.