Goa a favoured venue for the extravagant weddings, stag adventures, glitz and glamour display of the affluent, and those enchanted by ‘spinning wheels of fortune’; recently made an exception by hosting the 89th annual meeting of the Indian Academy of Sciences, a premier society of scientists established by Sir CV Raman in 1934. The local hosts for this intellectual feast was a gem in the ‘pearl string’ of Indian Institutes of higher learning, The BITS Pilani, Goa campus, along with the National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research, Goa; a logistic and scientific command centre for Indian Expeditions to Antarctica, Arctic and the Himalayas.
As an incentive to the academia, the academy invited a few teachers of higher education to participate in the symposium on the ‘challenges faced and the way forward’. I was privileged to have been an ‘educator invitee’, and sat through all the technical sessions and lectures of the accomplished ‘Fellows’.
Representing diverse knowledge domains, these men and women of science and technology had assembled in Goa. This was an extraordinary gathering of India’s best scientific and technological minds, and I thoroughly relished this opportunity to hear, interact and learn. Through the three days of the event, the air was filled with excitement, exchange and expectations towards strengthening scientific temper and showcasing recent advances within the confines of Indian science laboratories and research institutions.
From polymer chemistry, to drug designing and quantum solution for Euler’s 36 officers problem to monitoring phenology of forests; the science folks presented it all, satiating and immensely satisfying a hungry mind. After every session, my innocuous curiosity and pertinent questions were addressed with great enthusiasm by these erudite speakers without feeling challenged or offended.
By their aura and acumen, these erudite ‘Fellows of the academy’ dwarfed me; and in their humility and respectful conduct I felt exactly what Sudama would have experienced in Krishna’s royal dwelling; humbled and overwhelmed being treated respectfully!
After my doctoral studies, over the years every time I attend such events and witness the strides in the outstanding research of these science giants, I get swept by a sense of underperformance, dereliction and guilt. Despite having authored over 50-odd research papers in diverse areas of animal science, with three Scopus-indexed publications in this academic year itself; I feel that I have not given my best research output being in a routine grind as an undergraduate teacher.
Of course, my remorse is relative and the tone that of lament rather than envy, that if in our institutes of higher education we could inculcate in our learners a sense of enquiry and application, and offered requisite facilities and funding to teachers with inclination for research; our colleges and universities would emerge as frontline ‘knowledge ecosystems’ for exploration, innovation and application.
For decades together the Indian academia and public funded research institutes have existed and operated in watertight silos, refusing to acknowledge each other as key players in advancement of relevant research. While research ideas sprout from understanding, analysis and assimilation of fundamental knowledge being transacted in academia, our teachers are encumbered by curricular load, co-curricular compulsions, and administrative compliances. The scant resources and dearth of research culture especially in affiliated colleges kills the ‘curiosity’.
This chronic reciprocal disavowal between Indian academia and public funded research laboratories has been the biggest holdup to the progress of science in our country. It is also the cause of an invisible ‘intellectual apartheid’ and structural racialization in Indian higher education, with some brilliant minds being pushed into an ‘academic standstill’ simply because they are affiliates of a deficient system that lacks a research culture, and offers no encouragement and incentives for research.
Contrary to this dismal situation, there are the largest public-treasury funded ‘Hub and Spoke model’ like the AcSIR (Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research) that also indulge in academics offering research degree programmes in 38 CSIR institutes across India, where the scientists additionally designated as per academic hierarchy of higher education have access to the best facilities in frontier areas of research in science and technology.
In our colleges research gets driven largely by coercion and rarely by passion. In the first instance, the bait is promotion and monetary incentives, besides that alluring nominative title. In the latter case, it’s that inexplicable intellectual craving for delving deep into things as an entitlement of a teacher. It is only a curious and restless mentor who can motivate his /her pupils for research.
The current scheme of career advancement in academics that emphasizes research and relies on API scores of faculty aspiring to ascend the academic ladder; has killed research ethics ushering in a culture of shallow, superfluous and superfast publications in predatory and cloned journals. Just last week, my research collaborator and I have written to the Dean and VC of a reputed eastern Indian university regarding one of their faculty and student who have reported presence of Nile Crocodile and Komodo Dragons in India, in their research paper in a UGC approved journal with 7.95 impact factor!
The lust of professorial aspirations without acumen and domain expertise seriously dents credibility of these high-ranking posts and defeats the quality initiative in academics. By catapulting the undeserving to the high pedestal, the system decimates meritocracy and opens a crèche for the abundant progeny of mediocrity.
Those genuinely seeking to research but limited by funds and facilities must find their own way through collaborations with the resourceful peers, and our national ‘centres of excellence’ must demonstrate their willingness to handhold the underprivileged yet deserving academic peers.
Driven by the NEP 2020 and in line with the PM Modi’s vision for ‘expanded research ecosystem’, Goa has established Goa State Research Foundation chaired by an eminent biologist Prof MK Janarthanam. It is my conviction that Jana (as many fondly call him) should be able to demolish the obstacles and clear bottlenecks encountered by researchers in Goa’s academia and promote integration of research in teaching.
