Indian Science Congress 2011

What Ails Indian Science Education ?

Vinod Varshney

The truth of Indian Universities is that much attention is not given on research, which is quite natural in the Indian situation when power and money matter more than knowledge and sincerity. The educational culture is being vitiated fast by mushrooming private universities and colleges, many of which have been opened with the blatant intention of only making money.


No surprise that any conscientious academic would lament that even after 63 years of independence we don’t have even one which can be counted among the top 200 universities of the world. This fact was effectively underscored by Dr K. C. Pandey the General President of the Indian Science Congress in his Presidential speech Tuesday in SRM University of Chennai.


Unluckily his speech would not find sufficient space in the mainstream media, which remains more concerned about reporting what government leaders say.


Beleagured Leader Loses Sheen

The 98th Indian Science Congress was inaugurated Tuesday by Prime Minister Dr Man Mohan Singh, a beleaguered leader amidst his government’s multi-billion dollar 2-G spectrum scam which has taken away much of the sheen from his gentle appeal. One can leave aside most part of his lecture, except one glaring reality “that while C. V. Raman won the Nobel Prize eighty years ago for the Raman Effect, most of the instruments available in India today using this principle are imported.”


Why is it so? Dr Singh has not ant remedy for this. He only mentioned the malady that that was not an isolated example. "Many of our outstanding scientific discoveries had been converted into marketable products by technologists and firms based abroad."


So what is wrong with India? Everybody knows that its political culture is the real problem, which breeds, supports and cover up corruption. The culture of corruption has seeped deep inside the educational institutions also and politicians have been active participants of all this sordid happening. If political culture remains as it is, there is no hope that Indian science education would get any major change.  


What Are the Solutions?

What has been offered as solutions? Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal, as is his wont, blared out an agenda, which he thinks can make India a "hot spot of innovation". The agenda will include long term academia-industry collaborative relationships with open access to and resources free of intellectual property entanglements; better integration of corporate with higher educational and research institutions, encourage multidisciplinary collaboration among business, government, academia and R&D, thereby creating an environment that supports technological development. Definitely these are fanciful words which an illustrious lawyer politician can always utter.


It will take genuine strenuous efforts and long time to bring into practice even a few of these things as spelling out an agenda is one thing but to do concrete work is a diffrent ball game which requires real sincerity and sense of commitment.

Chennai to host 98th Indian Science Congress
Reports Vinod Varshney

K C Pande

New Delhi. S.R.M. University of Chennai will host the 98th Indian Science Congress next year. This was decided Saturday evening in Trivandrum by the Council of the Indian Science Congress Association.
SRM University is a private technical university, celebrating its silver jubilee this year. It claims outstanding laboratories and infrastructure.
Osmania University of Hyderabad was a close contender for the chance to host it followed by institutes of Kolkata and Nanded.

Chennai gets this honour the Seventh Time

Chennai, the capital city of Tamilnadu would be getting the honour to host this reputed science meet the seventh time. Though Kolkata has the record of hosting the largest number of Science Congresses, ten times out of 97 so far.
The last one in Chennai was held in 1999 when Dr Manju Sharma was the General President and inaugurated by Atal Behari Vajpayee, the then Prime Minster.
Chennai had traditionally been considered the second science capital of India, the first one being Calcutta. Though Calcutta now has been replaced by Bangalore.
It may be recalled the 1st Indian Science Congress was held in Kolkata 1914 and the 2nd next year in Chennai, then called Madras. Chennai had also the distinction of having organised the Science Congress in 1929 with the only Indian Nobel Laureate Sir C.V. Raman being its General President.
Prof K. C. Pande Will be the Chennai Congress Hero

The next year Chennai would be hosting the Science Congress with Prof K C Pande as the General President. This is a departure from the tradition of electing some scientist from the government establishment as the General President.
Prof Pande is purely an academician who had been Vice Chancellor of Chaudhary Charan Singh University, Meerut. Since the focal theme of next year’s Science Congress is going to be related to Science Teaching and Quality Research in Universities, his choice as the General President seems quite appropriate.
However the theme has yet to be fine-tuned in the next Council meeting of Indian Science Congress Association within a week, said Dr G Madhavan Nair, the General President of the 97th Congress.