Thanks to the aspirational
leadership of Prime Minister Modi foreign policy is ahead of curve but lack of
visionary leadership in scientific affairs failed to make impressive gains. The
enthusiasm and vitality needed to kick start STEAM (Science, Technology,
Engineering, Agriculture and Medicine) was missing. Modi, who clinched power on
the vociferous commitment towards change and development, instilled a ray of
hope in the scientific community too. During his first Prime Ministerial
address from the ramparts of the Red fort on the eve of Independence Day with
the grand announcement of ‘Make in India’ scientists believed that indigenous science
and technology would be bolstered and believed that acche din would ensue. To accomplish the task of good governance
and transparency too digitisation has to be stepped up. For the ease of doing
business to become a reality, advanced the technical know-how has to be augured.
Thus these propellers are expected to generate a needed momentum to usher the
potential Indian science into a new realm of scientific exuberance.
At ground level the new regime
was welcomed by the burden of discrepancies, discontinuities in implementation
of various schemes and pending appointment of heads to various elite national
institutions of the UPA II. In a bid to
revamp the appointment process and bring in transparency, the new government
scrapped the old appointment process. Earlier appointment of heads was made by
a search committee of eminent scientists who would talk to probable candidates
informally or would walk in without prior notice into their work places and
approve candidature. According to the
new system advertisement of the vacant posts, screening and short listing of applications,
holding of interview have become mandatory to make an official appointment. This
move was welcomed by a group of scientists who believed that it created an
equal opportunity for the rapidly growing scientific faculty overriding the
rider of familiarity and high-connections. However top-notch scientists rebuked
the decision as they have to invest extra valuable man-hours to screen numerous
applications before making a crucial appointment.
Consequently Modi government is mired
in the quagmire of appointing heads for several elite national research
institutions. Of the 38 institutions, currently only 25 have full term heads
and others are managed by temporary or acting heads. Since January 2014, CSIR
(Council for Scientific and Industrial Research) the backbone for scientific
and technological research institute is without a head. With stalling of
several key appointments, the national innovation system will bear the brunt.
Meanwhile the intentions of
government were severely doubted and the veracity of their commitment was
blissfully lost in the cacophony of dubious arguments about ancient Indian
scientific and technological prowess made during the Indian Science Congress. Scientists
opined that hankering to the ancient glory is a futile exercise if we fail to
attain excellence in the contemporary sciences. While the appointment of the
renowned physician Dr. Harshvardhan as the Minister of Science and Technology
was highly applauded, his subsequent removal for political reasons was regarded
as clumsy step. The much awaited budgetary allocations made on the National
Science Day, couldn’t cheer scientific community as no big-ticket initiatives
or big-bang reforms were announced. With no perceptible increase in fund
allocation to research and development, acche
din seem to still elude Indian scientists. Despite profusely thanking scientists for
their relentless pursuits on the astounding success of Mangalyaan mission the
allocation to Department of Space pegged at Rs 6000 crores wasn’t increased in
the budget. Although India is located in an earthquake region the finances for
Department of Earth sciences was reduced by 7%. High level of protein malnutrition
is prevalent in India but central nodal agricultural research agency, Indian
Council for Agriculture Research (ICAR) is tipped to experience a fund shortage
of 24 crores.
Modi government flagged off several
new scientific initiatives. A fund of Rs 50 Crore was allocated to a
collaborative effort between the US and ISRO, for constructing and launching of
a high-end satellite NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar Mission (NISAR) by
2012. It aims to observe earth and monitoring climate change. To boost up
three-stage nuclear programme, budget allocation for Department of Atomic
Energy was increased by 12.6%. Interestingly allocation to Ministry of water
resources was slashed by 50%. As a friendly gesture towards the SAARC nations
Modi announced earlier that ISRO would develop a geostationary SAARC satellite
positioned over the subcontinent. Accordingly Rs 2 crore is allotted to ISRO
towards construction of the satellite.
To propel the ‘Digital India’ and
‘Make in India’ initiatives a National Super Computing Facility was launched.
It connects the national academic and R&D institutions with a grid over 70
high-performance computing facilities. With regards to supercomputing while
China is number 1 with 500 supercomputers India is ranked 74 and has 9 such
computers. The high performance computing will give a major fillip to financial
services, weather forecasting, earth quake forecasting, space craft, vehicle
and ship designing, oil exploration missions.
Elevation and appointment of
visionary scientific leaders like Dr. Vijaya Raghavan to Department of
Biotechnology and Dr. Ashutosh Sharma to Department of Science and Technology
instilled new hope and scientific vigour by cutting down bureaucratic red-tape.
In a major move Dr. Sharma mandated that time taken from submission of a
project proposal to its analysis and scrutiny and receipt of funds be completed
in four months. With trimming of funds allotted to DBT, Dr. Raghavan intends to
partner with state governments under the grand “cooperative federalism” and
make use of the limited resources at his dispensation.
Extension of the retirement for
senior scientists used to be a norm in India. This system prevented the
promotion of younger generation into higher echelons. The unceremonious sacking
of former Defence and Research Organisation (DRDO) head Avinash Chander who was
an extension of contract by the Defence Minister didn’t go well with senior
scientists. Similarly four other senior scientists too were denied of
extensions after retirement. With denial of extensions after retirement Modi
government has reversed the trend of UPA where in 11 senior scientists are on
extension from 2012 in premier institutions and thus new blood is infused into
system.
To bride the energy deficit, Modi
made strong pitch for renewable sources of energy and set an ambitious target
of generating 100 gigawatts of of solar power by 2020. Currently India generates
23 gigawatts of power becoming the fourth largest producer of wind power,
equalling Spain. To effectuate “gigawatt obsession” giant solar plants are to
be constructed in huge stretches of land. But obtaining land from areas with
dense population and infrastructure is meted with stiff opposition. Building
giant solar parks in remote areas and connecting them to existing electrical
grid system is cumbersome. Analysts in renewable energy field worried that specialised
focus on solar power units might shadow the past successes of the wind power.
If initiatives of Digital India
and Make in India have to truly succeed indigenous manufacturing sector has to
be robust, economical and should be infused with advanced technology. Finally
the dream of creating more jobs in the defence and manufacturing sector can be
achieved by strengthening Indian Science. The grandiose plans of vibrant India
are pointless until unless Indian science is fostered.
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