An investigation by The Indian Express has found that of the 22 private companies selected for soft loans from a new government deep-tech fund, 15 have investment ties to seven members of the selection committee. These 15 firms together received more than ₹1,377 crore of the total ₹2,192 crore approved in the first round of the Research, Development and Innovation (RDI) Fund.
The companies were chosen from 124 applicants by a 12-member Investment Committee of the Technology Development Board under the Ministry of Science and Technology. Eleven members are private equity and technology professionals, and one is a non-voting government representative. The fund was launched in November 2025 to support work in space, energy, pharmaceuticals and related fields.
Nine of the selected firms are linked to the panel’s chairman, Saurabh Srivastava, co-founder of the Indian Angel Network. Srivastava holds a personal stake of 0.75 percent in Noccarc Robotics, which received ₹11.41 crore. Other companies connected to him or his network include EndureAir Systems (₹30.01 crore), BigEndian Semiconductors (₹130 crore), e-TRNL Energy (₹94 crore), Dhruva Space (₹105 crore), Astrome Technologies (₹64.05 crore), Peptris Technologies (₹86 crore), Serigen Mediproducts (₹20 crore) and Manastu Space Technologies (₹116 crore).
Other panel members with disclosed links include K R S Jamwal (formerly of Tata Industries), connected to Tejas Networks (₹250 crore) and several others, Gopal Srinivasan of TVS Capital Funds, linked to Agnikul Cosmos (₹200 crore), Sudhir Mehta, connected to Replus Engitech (₹42.75 crore), Sanjay Nayak, linked to Tejas Networks and Ather Energy (₹211.89 crore), Anand Deshpande of Persistent Systems, holding shares in Serigen Mediproducts, and Debashish Bhattacharjee, linked to NeoSeeker Metals (₹10 crore).
The seven members have stated that they disclosed their interests and recused themselves from evaluations involving linked firms. The Department of Science and Technology has said the selections were made “purely on merit” with no involvement of conflicted members. Science and Technology Minister Jitendra Singh, responding to a parliamentary question from Congress Rajya Sabha MP Praveen Chakravarty, listed the seven members who had disclosed financial interests.
Yet the scale of the overlap remains striking. More than 60% of the companies chosen, accounting for over 60 percent of the money disbursed, have direct or network ties to the very people who sat on the selection panel. Public funds intended to build strategic deep-tech capacity have flowed in large measure to firms already connected to the evaluators. Formal disclosure and recusal may satisfy the letter of the guidelines, but they do not erase the appearance that a closed circle of investors has directed public money toward its own portfolio companies.
Chakravarty has argued that public money requires stricter standards than private investment committees. A panel handling strategic research funding, he suggested, should consist mainly of scientists and academics without for-profit stakes. The current arrangement, dominated by private equity and technology investors, raises a basic question of institutional design: whether a government fund of this size can claim neutrality when so many of its beneficiaries sit within the investment networks of those who selected them.
Seven of the 22 firms have no reported links to the committee. The rest of the story however, is one of concentrated connections. When public resources intended for national technological capacity are routed so heavily through the same networks that sit in judgment, the process invites scrutiny that formal recusals alone cannot fully answer.
