Toying around with science

The sacking of Avinash Chander, head of the Defence Research and Development Organisation, has shaken the world of scientific research. Coming on the heels of the delayed appointment of a new chief for the Indian Space Research Organisation and continuing adhocism at the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, it points to the larger issue of how our top scientific agencies function and how the government handles them.

The explanation given by the defence minister is pathetic. He says DRDO needs a younger leadership. What it and other scientific agencies actually need is a complete overhaul. A full blueprint for DRDO’s reform has been ready and waiting since 2010.

The present government has not yet committed to implementing the P Rama Rao panel’s recommendations made in 2008. They included decentralising the DRDO management and merging some of its labs with other public-funded labs working in similar areas, overhauling its human resources policy and establishing a commercial arm for technology business.

The last time we heard of reforms in scientific agencies was in 1987 when a committee headed by Abid Hussain, then a member of the Planning Commission, was set up to review the functioning of the CSIR. Rajiv Gandhi wanted to reorient research and development. Hussain recommended that all CSIR labs generate a third of their budget from external research earnings.

This was implemented in the early 1990s and many national labs were forced to open up. Some of them did very well as the move coincided with the economic reforms initiated in 1991. Many labs were renamed and their research reoriented.

However, several other substantive recommendations remain unimplemented. For instance, it was recommended that directors be appointed for a non-renewable six-year term, and a special stream of talented experts be appointed on contract for a fixed duration at a higher salary.

The Department of Space (DoS) underwent minor tinkering, in the aftermath of the infamous Antrix-Davos scandal. Prior to this, one person wore four hats — those of secretary of DoS, and chairman of ISRO, the Space Commission and Antrix Corporation. This created severe conflict of interest. Now Antrix has its own chairman and managing director.

Other scientific conglomerates that urgently need drastic administrative and scientific reforms are the Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR) and the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). Over the decades, these councils have gathered a lot of dead wood and urgently need cleaning up. Each of the scientific councils controls dozens of national and regional laboratories.

The number of these labs has constantly been growing. At times, several labs are working in the same discipline under the same council, as well as under different councils. The observation of the Abid Hussain panel about CSIR was that the very concept of a research council is a myth because it is a mere collection of labs with little interaction or integration. This is relevant for all the research councils and scientific departments even today.

In the past 15 years, India has witnessed a great expansion of its science and technology infrastructure with new departments and institutions being established. The expansion of the IITs and rolling out of the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research are part of this wave of institution building.

Budgetary support for scientific departments has increased substantially. The funding for scientific departments (agriculture research not included) during the Eleventh Plan was about ₹59,000 crore. It is projected to more than double to ₹1,42,000 crore during the Twelfth Plan period.

However, all this has happened without any expressed desire to reform, improve quality and put new demands on the system.

The methods of funding research projects are not transparent and merit-based. Review mechanisms are not credible and scientists don’t have functional autonomy. Linkages with industry and academia are neither institutionalised nor incentivised.

Promotions are based on the number of papers published and patents filed, and not on the relevance of research or commercial potential.

Without addressing all these issues in a planned, calibrated way, and instead merely sacking a research council head amounts to tokenism. If there is reform blueprint, we are yet to see it.

The writer is a science journalist and author based in New Delhi

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