The Union Cabinet on Wednesday, April 19, 2023, approved the  Rs. 6,003 crore National Quantum Mission (NQM) that will fund research and development of quantum computing technology and associated applications.

• Quantum computers are a work-in-progress globally and exploit properties of the atom, which are only explainable by the principles of quantum mechanics.
• The promise is a reliable class of computers that work several times faster than the speediest machines of today and also facilitate exponentially secure communication networks, with wide applications.
• The mission was budgeted for ?8,000 crore in the Union Budget of 2023.
• The plan involves developing “intermediate scale” quantum computers with 20-50 physical ‘qubits’ in three years, 50-100 physical qubits in five years and 50-1,000 physical qubits in eight years.
• Just like bits (1 and 0) are the basic units by which computers process information, ‘qubits’ or ‘quantum bits’ are the units of process by quantum