Supercomputers in India: PARAM, AI Supercomputing, and Global Rankings

Introduction

A supercomputer is a computer with exceptional processing power, capable of performing billions to trillions of calculations per second (FLOPS - Floating Point Operations Per Second). Supercomputers are critical for scientific research, weather forecasting, defence simulations, drug discovery, and artificial intelligence. India's journey in supercomputing began with the PARAM series in the 1980s and has accelerated under the National Supercomputing Mission (NSM).

Evolution of Supercomputers in India

Phase 1: The PARAM Era (1980s-1990s)

• 1988: PARAM 8000 - India's first supercomputer, developed by C-DAC under Dr. Vijay Bhatkar.
• 1991: PARAM 8600 - Upgraded performance with 128 nodes.
• 1998: PARAM 10000 - Achieved 100 GigaFLOPS, marking India's entry into teraflop computing.
• Significance: Built after US denied export of Cray supercomputers, demonstrating indigenous capability.

Phase 2: Distributed Supercomputing (2000-2010)

• PARAM Padma (2002): 1 TeraFLOPS, ranked among top 100 globally.
• EKA (2007): Built by Tata Group, achieved 117 TeraFLOPS, ranked 4th globally at debut.
• PARAM Yuva (2008): 54 TeraFLOPS, focused on academic research.

Phase 3: National Supercomputing Mission (2015-Present)

• Launched: 2015, jointly by Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) and Department of Science and Technology (DST).
• Implementing Agencies: C-DAC...