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The planet's best scientists are searching for God, in France. Why are we here? What miracle of nature gave us birth? What sustains us? They're asking those questions at the Big Bang Experiment - the world's largest, most expensive science project. France, has been co-host to that endevour, for over fifty years.

Now, French science is reaching out to India. Twenty three of their best scientists are touring twenty Indian cities this month, delivering over one hundred lectures on everything from nanotechnology to philosophy to virtual reality. Look up the schedule for your city at http://www.frenchsciencetoday.org. This is one part of the Bonjour India French festival, kicked off earlier this month.

Ecole Polytechnique, one of France's best universities is conducting entrance exams in premier Indian colleges like St Xavier's, Ruia, Jai Hind and Wilson in Mumbai, Presidency College, Kolkata and St Stephen's, Delhi. High ranking students are being offered full scholarships for study in France. It also plans to share visiting faculty with the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology in Trivandrum.

The French space agency and ISRO, are jointly studying India's monsoons and generating data on the subcontinent's water cycle. India and France together spend three million euros every year on joint scientific research. That money helped establish Indo-French laboratories like the Joint Laboratory for Sustainable Chemistry and the Indo French Centre for Ground Water Research in Hyderabad and the Indo French Water Cell at IISc, Bangalore.

What could the French possibly get from us? Besides world class brains with a thorough base in theoretical science, we can offer them cutting edge research done with a fraction of the budgets abroad. Case in point - India's maiden moon mission Chandrayaan, was the cheapest moon shot in the history of science. And the only one that made it there on the first try.

What can the French offer us? An opportunity for hands on study, on equipment many Indian labs still don't have. An education system that's powered thirty-one Nobel prize winners till date. And expertise in hi-speed locomotives, aerospace and Nuclear Science, areas where the French are still, world beaters.