Bengaluru: City scientists decry NR Narayana Murthy’s remarks on poor science research

Bengaluru: Infosys founder Narayana Murthy caused outrage, setting off a fierce debate among the scientific community with his convocation address at the Indian Institute of Science on Wednesday, when he said that nothing significant has come of Indian research in the last 60 years.

Members of the scientific community unanimously agreed that Murthy’s remarks on Indian contributions being “nil” were uncalled for, even if they do have a ring of truth to them.

Graduating students, in particular, were especially affronted. “Comparing IISc with Harvard or Berkeley or MIT is illogical,” said Prathamesh Turaga, a doctoral student at IISc. “The institute has to maintain a very tricky balance between meeting the immediate needs of a country in which around 76 per cent live on a bare minimum, and making a mark in cutting research. Has Murthy forgotten that IISc produced people like Madhav Gadgil and AK Reddy?” he asked.

Nikunj Goel, who received his undergraduate degree at the convocation ceremony on Wednesday, also strongly disagrees with the statement that Indian contributions to science have, as in Murthy’s words, been “nil,”.

Prof Balram, former director, IISc, who made an impassioned address at the institute’s recent global alumni meet, over global university rankings felt that “NRN is creating a controversy where I suspect none exists.”

Echoing other students, Goel pointed to IISc stalwarts. “We have people like Professor Balram, Professor CNR Rao who have produced so many highly cited papers, C.V. Raman and AK Ramanujan.” However Goel conceded that “ Murthy is justified in saying that Indian research has not been up to par, because our potential has not been realised. I do agree with the point that our alumni need to play a greater role.”

Funding for scientific research only began post liberalisation, Prof. Balram said, pointing out that “In science and technology, researchers are in a race where the other guys are a lap ahead to begin with. We're not going to catch up anytime soon. Comparisons like these only make for immediate publicconsumption.”

The research community has a number of issues that need to be looked into, agreed Professor HP Khincha, Adviser to the Director, Indian Institute of Science. “Autonomy, for instance, is undoubtedly a worry,” he said. “Despite that, in my opinion, Murthy's statements were quite relative. That is the light in which we should see them.” Only hard evidence can decide this matter, said Mohandas Pai, Chairman, Manipal Global Educaation.

“If Murthy was wrong, disprove him with data. If he is right, then how do we improve? First, at least 10 per cent of our universities should be research based and they need their autonomy. Public funding is a necessity and people need to be incentivised to do reseearch here. We also need to incentivise research papers that are highly cited. If we do this, there will be an improvement in a decade.”