E-Letter responses to:

essays: Raghunath A. Mashelkar GLOBAL VOICES OF SCIENCE: India's R&D: Reaching for the Top Science 2005; 307: 1415-1417 [Summary] [Full text] [PDF]

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Published E-Letter responses:

India : From Glorious History to Bright Future

Pawan Kumar   (5 August 2005)

India's R&D, unrealistic optimism

Achal Pashine   (5 August 2005)

Can India's potential be fully utilized?

Ken Dev   (5 August 2005)

A Boost to young Indian Researchers

Abhay Kumar   (5 August 2005)

Improve the university system and India will go a long way

Kalluri S. Rao   (5 August 2005)

India will shine

Saumitra Mukherjee   (5 August 2005)

A Graduate Student's View of Science in India

Bibhash Mukhopadhyay   (5 August 2005)

Role of Indian Institutes of Science and Technology

Phaneendra K. Yalavarthy   (7 June 2005)

Use the Knowledge power in the right direction

Harinarayana, Tirumalachetty, University of Tokyo, Japan   (17 March 2005)

Very heartening to read the optimistic projection!

Dilip G. Banhatti, Madurai-Kamaraj University, Madurai 625021, India   (17 March 2005)

India Shining ?!!!

Geetha Vani Rayasam   (17 March 2005)

R&D in India

Gulshan R. Saini   (17 March 2005)

India : From Glorious History to Bright Future 5 August 2005
Pawan Kumar, Student Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology , India Respond to this E-Letter: Re: India : From Glorious History to Bright Future	It is time to be proud of the achievements Indian have made in every field. From economics to science, from medicine to agriculture, we Indians are progressing. And this has not happened in a day or two. It took 50 years to reach this. But the brighter side of the coin is that it is just 50 years after independence as compared to the other developed countries. We have gone from from unrecognized to recognized, from dependent to independent in food, science, industries, space technology, etc. As rightly said, the 21st century belongs to India. In this regard, I am dangerously optimistic. Problems are definitely thereand need to be solved as quickly as possible. We cannot afford to sit. We just need persistence to excel. We have a glorious history and we need to make our future bright.
India's R&D, unrealistic optimism 5 August 2005
Achal Pashine, Researcher Chiron Corporation, Emeryville, CA Respond to this E-Letter: Re: India's R&D, unrealistic optimism	It was indeed heartening to read the optimism projected by Mashelkar in his Essay "India's R&D: reaching for the top." However, I felt that the essay is overly optimistic, to the point that it turns a blind eye to many of the realities that are holding India from becoming a true top tier scientific enterprise. Clearly, as Mashelkar points out, the investment by the Indian government in science is increased compared to the 1970s, but whether the increase is proportional to the GDP increase is not known. Moreover, investment and productivity will not be linear and the lack of infrastructure to utilize that investment will perhaps be a rate limiting factor (thus, the calculated 31.7 number is perhaps a dream, not reality). Much of the hype and visibility of recent increased scientific creativity is perhaps due to the centers such as Welch technology center, Intel, IBM, and Motorola that Mashelkar refers to, which possibly are in India for capital gains and not to create a "global knowldege pool for global good through global funding." In order to truely increase the scientific sparkle of the country, one perhaps will have to overhaul our infrastructure. Productivity will increase not just by importing "flow cells," but by ensuring that consistant electricity is available to run them. Similar other essential infrastructures, like health coverage, transportation, etc. and changes in nepotism, red-tapism, and corruption may be necessary to truly get the technical leaders (not the technicians to work for Intel or IBM or GE)to return for country's good. We are closer to this than we were just 10 years ago, but the pace that Mashelkar envisons is much faster than the reality. One must definitely commend a shoeless boy who is now Director General of CSIR, but one must also not forget the hundreds of Ph.D.'s that India yearly churns out who have no hope but to look to the West to provide a wall to paint and express their creativity.
Can India's potential be fully utilized? 5 August 2005
Ken Dev, Cancer Scientist/Consultant/Freelance writer/ Gene Delivery & Expression Sciences Respond to this E-Letter: Re: Can India's potential be fully utilized?	Recently I spent seven weeks in India giving talks in Bombay, Delhi, and Calcutta. I also made several presentations to a group of doctors and the Managing Dierctor (like the CEO in the United States) of a leading hospital with the proposal that a cancer hospital be set up in the eastern part of India with an adjoining cancer research facility that will recruit the very best available cancer scientists. I also had a meeting with Mashelkar in Delhi. All I can say he is one of true visionaries I have met who is changing the face of CSIR. His enthusiam for India and Indian science is boundless. I hope the faculty in all the universities will have a fraction of his enthusiasm. Unfortunately, he does not have much control over universities. My recollection is he told me that CSIR labs are now filing more patents and publishing more important papers than the universities (one must bear in mind that not all universities in India have access to the same facilities). I talked with many university professors who have spent many years in the US, UK, or Europe and then went back to India. I don't know why, but after a few years in India, apathy sets in, despite no lack of resources. This applies even to the medical profession. For example, in one top hospital, staffed with physicians and surgeons, all having the highest professional qualifications from abroad, I was told after a talk I gave on molecular medicine and cancer therapeutics, "You are 10 years ahead." I said, "Nothing of the kind. The fact is you are simply not keeping up with the literature." Even at the famous IITs, I was told that once somebody gets even a junior faculty position, it is for life, irrespective of the quality of his/her research for years to come. Nobody can ask him/her to leave. A professor in Delhi IIT told me, "There is no accountability." I just wish there will be more transparency when it comes to promotion, award of grants and total absence of parochialism at the time of recruitment. I wrote an article, after attending the 2003 Nobel Prize ceremony in Stockholm, about the current problems that are preventing some very bright Indian scientists from reaching the top and I sent copies of the article to many scientists and I hope they will discuss some of those issues and/or implement suggestions given there [India West, CA, April 30, 2004, "Can We Produce a Future Indian Nobelist?"].
A Boost to young Indian Researchers 5 August 2005
Abhay Kumar, Life science Research IIT Bombay Respond to this E-Letter: Re: A Boost to young Indian Researchers	Surely this picture projected by Dr Mashelkar is going to raise the morale of young researchers of India who sometimes think that doing cutting-edge research in India is a far-away possibility. A few years down the line, I hope that with more and more talented persons contributing to Indian science, with enhanced government and industry support, we will be able to become a knowledge hub of the world in real sense. Kudos to Dr. Mashelkar! Abhay Kumar PhD School of Biosciences and Bioengineering IIT Bombay
Improve the university system and India will go a long way 5 August 2005
Kalluri S. Rao, Emeritus Professor & INSA Senior Scientist University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad-500 046. India Respond to this E-Letter: Re: Improve the university system and India will go a long way	The article by Mashelkar is well written and timely. India has all the potential to become a scientific power. However, the country seems to ignore starting a good path for achieving this end. First, Indian system is crippled with many factors and is not tuned to discriminate between talent and show. Even in those cases where talent is noticed, bureaucracy and science managers exercise allosteric control on the whole process of that talent blooming into achievement and discoveries. Second, India, for some peculiar reason, ignores the college and university systems that are the actual manufactutring units of the scientific and intellectual force of the country. Deplorable conditions that prevail in Indian Universities. Once the College and University system is overhauled in terms of academic administration and where the professors would have a real say about the running of the system, this would have a miraculous effect on the country in its overall development. Mashelkar's hope and dream can come ture.
India will shine 5 August 2005
Saumitra Mukherjee, Associate Professor Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi-110067, IN Respond to this E-Letter: Re: India will shine	I agree with the views of Raghunath A. Mashelkar that there is no dearth of science and technology personnel in India. Indian scientists are being threatened by caste politics and regionalism by the science managers. I went on deputation to University of Liverpool, UK through Commonwealth commission and returned to India recently. I never faced any racial discrimination in UK by the fellow scientists; however, it exists among the general masses. In India, I am facing regional as well as caste politics among colleagues. This is one of the regions of slow performance of science by Indian scientists in India, who have shown excellent output in the United States, the UK, and other developed countries. India will definitely shine in the field of science if we can overcome the outdated regionalism and caste politics.
A Graduate Student's View of Science in India 5 August 2005
Bibhash Mukhopadhyay Baylor College of Medicine Respond to this E-Letter: Re: A Graduate Student's View of Science in India	I was really inspired after reading Mashelkar’s Essay in Science (Science, Vol 307, Issue 5714, 1415-1417, 4 March 2005). I am a graduate student in Developmental Biology at the Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas in the United States. Prior to that, I had done my undergraduate in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi (branded as the top notch medical school in India) followed by a Masters in Neuroscience from Max Planck Research School at University of Goettingen in Germany, with an intermittent stop at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel for a summer internship. I left India for “greener pastures” right after my undergraduate education because for everything I wanted to do, I was branded “too young” to do. I was 21 then. I wanted to learn to think the way actual scientist thought rather than just memorize huge quanta of facts presented mostly as “this happens, just know it". Hardly anyone went into how things were elucidated in first place, how elegantly experiments were carried out and observations made, how new avenues of research were opened, and why did something capture someone’s imagination at all. I wanted to do things with my own hands and talk to people and be excited about science. And what was I told “you are being too precocious” (of course, there were a few professors who were extremely supportive, but they were the exception rather than the rule). Apparently, these things were to be done only to be after I get a Ph.D. I felt all my enthusiasm and willingness to work hard to experience the joy of finding new things were being scuttled. On top of that, we were expected to keep certain professors in good humor (some students went to amazing extents to do this) or life would have become miserable because “no one makes enemies with the alligator if one has to survive in the same water as he does.” I also thought that if I were to do a Ph.D. in India, I would be paid something like 8000 Indian rupees, which would probably be okay for my own survival, athough not luxurious, would never be enough if I had to support my parents after they retired from their jobs. Frustration grew to such an extent that I was very desperate to prove that neither was I too “young” nor too “precocious.” But now I live thousands of miles away from my family strive to carve a niche for my own in the scientific community. Would I have been so desperate to leave India had I not been dampened in my enthusiasm right in the beginning, had I been given a “wall to paint upon”? I don’t think so. I studied on Indian tax-payers’ money and am trying to find a “wall to paint” in the United States. Yet isn’t there good science, especially biological science, done in India? Of course there is! I have noticed three papers, in Cell (Cell, 116, 577-589), in Nature (Nature, 428, 441 - 445), and in Molecular Cell (Molecular Cell, 17, 631-643), in the period of last 18 months. These bear testimony that research India is faring very well considering the infrastructure and big-funding heavy nature of modern biological sciences and the limited resources a "developing" country like India can afford for basic research. Mashelkar’s background (I am also a small town boy from a typical middle class background) and his views out very succinctly echoed in my heart and though presently I am yet to achieve something remarkable scientifically, I feel inspired not only to “paint the wall” but also to give back (and go back?) to my country sometime in future. Bibhash Mukhopadhyay Graduate Student Baylor College of Medicine One Baylor Plaza Houston, TX 77030 USA
Role of Indian Institutes of Science and Technology 7 June 2005
Phaneendra K. Yalavarthy Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College Respond to this E-Letter: Re: Role of Indian Institutes of Science and Technology	It is a treat to read the essay by R. A. Mashelkar on India’s R&D (1). The author has clearly discussed the “Reverse Brain-Drain” effect and the possibilities of India becoming a “global R&D hub.” One of the key issues he missed out is the role of Indian institutes, which are more likely to play a key role in this transition of becoming a “global R&D hub.” The author found 700 young Indian employees working in GE’s largest R& centre at Bangalore. Many of these employees are the alumnus of prestigious institutes like Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) and Indian Institute of Science (IISc). The Indian union budget for the year 2005-2006 (2) has allotted 1000 million Indian rupees (approx. 22.73 million US dollars) to IISc. In the Indian union budget speech, finance minister Mr. P. Chidambaram said “IISc has enjoyed a high reputation as a centre of excellence in research and development. The government believes that investments in institutions of higher education and R&D organizations are as important as investments in physical capital and physical infrastructure. What we need are world class universities and we must make a beginning with one institution.” Being an alumnus of IISc, I feel proud to say that IISc is really a world-class institute. I am certain that, by 2020, IISc will be ranked alongside Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, and Stanford. The Indian government needs to continue their funding to make this happen, and people like Dr. R. A. Mashelkar must make it a point to continue these efforts. The faculty appointments of these institutes, which people like me aspire to, need to be made more attractive for people to come back to India. Dual appointments in these institutes may improve Indian science outcome by attracting more talented Indian scientists who are working in foreign institutions. Transparency in such system must be ensured, so that these appointments do not leave some disappointmented (3). I strongly believe that efforts to make Indian science better and strong will continue. As stated by the author, by 2020 India will become a knowledge-based leader. Phaneendra K. Yalavarthy Thayer School of Engineering Dartmouth College, Hanover New Hampshire-037155 USA. e-mail: Phaneendra.K.Yalavarthy@dartmouth.edu References 1. R. A. Mashelkar, Science 307, 1415 (4 March 2005). 2. Indian union budget for 2005-2006: http://indiabudget.nic.in/ 3. A. Cho, Science 304, 1286 (28 May 2004).
Use the Knowledge power in the right direction 17 March 2005
Harinarayana, Tirumalachetty, visiting professor Earthquake Research Institute, University of Tokyo, Japan Respond to this E-Letter: Re: Use the Knowledge power in the right direction	The essay by Dr. R. A. Mashelkar, Director General, CSIR, on “India’s R & D: Reaching for the top” reflects the ideas of many positive thinking Indian scientists. Leaders like him at the decision-making level will certainly help India progress in the direction of a knowledge production center. We Indians lack much hardware and infrastructure facilities, but we have a wealth of software in the form of knowledge. The recent Information Technology boom in India is just one example. The whole world is utilizing the Indian’s software knowledge, but not many Indian companies. Let us take the example of Japan. They are very similar to India. Like India, they don’t have many natural resources. Japan has also had to face many problems with natural disasters, from earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, typhoons, very cold temperatures at certain places, to tsunamis. Lessons need to be learned from them. Bouncing back is in their culture, it seems. You can’t see any trace of World War II now in Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Due to proper utilization of knowledge power, they are again in one of the wealthiest countries. Similarly, in India, with proper use of youth power and the help of many renowned Indians working abroad, as Dr. Mashelkar said, India can become the world’s number one knowledge centre. But, as Mashelkar said, cards need to be played correctly at the right time toward the right goal. I hope that by putting the science and technology policies it in the right direction, the goals can be achieved.
Very heartening to read the optimistic projection! 17 March 2005
Dilip G. Banhatti, UGC Scientist-Reader School of Physics, Madurai-Kamaraj University, Madurai 625021, India Respond to this E-Letter: Re: Very heartening to read the optimistic projection!	It is very heartening to read Prof. Mashelkar's optimistic projections. However, as an academic somewhat disillusioned with the red- tape, favoritism, and very poor general infrastructure at average places like a university in India, I guess things will really have to drastically change very fast for India to emerge as THE world power by 2020, barely one and a half decades in the future. I heartily wish that this nationwide boost does happen!
India Shining ?!!! 17 March 2005
Geetha Vani Rayasam, Senior Scientist Ranbaxy Research Labs, Gurgaon, India Respond to this E-Letter: Re: India Shining ?!!!	Indeed, India is "India shining" with the abundant optimism in India and abroad and with growing number of articles citing this that have recently appeared in several journals. Interestingly, there has been a trend recently with Indian biological scientists publishing in several reputed journals, like Nature, Cell, Science, and others, which hitherto was not common. This could well be correlated with the reverse brain drain in recent years, and also increasing availability of funds for doing cutting edge research. The day is not far off when India might be leading the way in drug discovery too. However, the number of expatriate Indians returing is still a small flow. It should not be a difficult choice for them like it was for me to come back recently, after having spent several years in Europe and the United States. There are several things that need to be improved, like a more professional approach, less bureaucracy, and providing better salaries. These scientists bring with them the confidence, talent, and critical thinking much needed in research. I hope there comes a day when we are welcomed back without having to face the rebuke of your fellowmen that you could not suceed in the land of opportunities and when one can say with pride "I am going back to India."
R&D in India 17 March 2005
Gulshan R. Saini, Retired Formerly Research Scientist, Agriculture Canada Respond to this E-Letter: Re: R&D in India	As a native of India, it is always pleasing to hear about good things there. Mashelkar is right when he says that economics is not always the reason for the brain drain from developing countries. In 1960 when I returned to India with a Ph.D., I was very upset the way the politicians were indulging in nepotism and favoritism in scientific departments. I complained to Nehru who was Prime Minister at that time. We had half an hour discussion on this subject. Nehru directed me to see Prof. M.S. Thacker, the then DG of ICSIR if my expertise could be utilized in India. Now, I was up against the very prevalent red tape of bearucracy. Since I was an employee of the Punjab Government, all my papers were required to come through them. The Secretary of Agriculture in Punjab even threatened to take disciplinary action against me because it is against the Civil Service Regulations to approach politicians. I realized that it will be difficult for me to work in the Indian atmosphere. I resigned and moved to Canada where I worked for about 25 years with Agriculture Canda. There is no dearth of science and technology personnel in India. As I mentioned 38 years ago (Brain Drain Dilemma. Science 3 February, 1967, p. 514), India lacks good managers. Now, when I have to deal with various government departments there as an NRI, I still face the same inefficiency and red tape I used to face 50 years ago