R'n'D in India II

This continues from my last Blog. This weekend on Sunday ToI Mumbai edition(March 12.2006) carried out an article titled "Spot the Indian Nuke Scientist". The article is a nice way to emphasize my last point, namely, that of "Life after" a P.hD. There are very few options available to P.hD's in India. The opportunity cost of doing research in India Vis-a-Vis being a Tom,Dick and Harry in a TCS or Infosys is very high(As discussed in my previous blog).
The article talks about the fact that most of the people who work at BARC and related intitutes come from the heartlands of India, from places like Barelliy etc. etc. But it misses analysing the plight of the Urban youth. (By Urban youth, i mean the upwardly mobile class.) who have have the issue of the opportunity cost coming in.
To get into TCS, Infosys or Wipro you do not need to be some geek or exceptionally talented guy. But confidence and sophistication are given a lot of weightage. These are the qualities of the urban youth who easily land up in such 'cool' jobs.
But on the other hand the so called, Rural youth (However stud, he might be in his/her field) is low on self confidence, self-esteem and sophistication. It is because of these issues plus idea of a government job that they land up at such a place.
Another factor that keeps smart people at bay from these institutions is the fact that the work culture is pathetic to say the least. People have the perception that there is Red Tapism everywhere (It exists even in IITs.) The system is not meriocratic at all. At places like research institutes, Human Resources is a very big thing. It is infact the single biggest thing. And at such places you do not reward sucess and penalize faliure the system is definitely going to crash. Thats exactly what has happened in these research intitutions.
One of my friend after his 3rd year had gone for a Practical Training at GTRE, Bangalore. He was appalled to see that the engineers over there did'nt even know how to multiply imaginary numbers. He had to teach them!!!
It is great to see that we have some very great institutions for research like TIFR, ISRO,BARC which make me feel proud as an Indian. But the foundations of these institutions is in a deep mess right now and if nothing is done, you should stop dreaming about competing with china, leave along US.

R'n'D in India

These days a lot is going on in IIT Bombay to encourage people to go into research. From conducting "why am i in IIT?" sessions to inviting professors to every hostel to tell people about their field of research. It is nice that IIT is gearing up to meet the challenges for the future. But with all the good students either opting to go abroad or go for the booming "IT sector" or becoming cyber coolies the people left in fundamental research is dwindling. I think to stop people from moving out to other avenues it is very important to strike the propblem at the root itself. If we look at the things that people go for after their graduation we have the following:

Remuneration: This seems to be byfar the most important aspect while considering for a career. It is true that when one completes his P.hD his starting salary is high. But, junta takes such thing in a very short time horizon. maybe a 6 months or a year. A PhD at IIT gets hardly 8-10k where as a starting salary for a IIT graduate these days is 30k which is 3 times the stipend of a PhD.

Travel: Another lucrative offer for doing research could be the lure of foreing conferences. But have a look at the funding provided for attending conferences. It is a pittance in india. At the same time MIT offers $1500 just for attending conferences per student every year. In IIT the offer is abysmal, where IIT offers Rs.25000 and for the rest of the funding you will haev to apply to DST,GoI and other funding agencies. So this is also not lucrative enough.

Reserch: Now coming down to the work. Reserch here is severly strifled by the lack of infrastructure. One of my friend says that he is tired of modelling and simualating and wants to do some experimental research and for that purpose the is apping to the US. May be the argument is very far fetched, but it is true. We at IIT have a cluster( 64 nodes, blah blah). But half the time all nodes are down and other half the time 50% nodes are down. so even the compuatational power available to these reaearch institutes is pathetic to say the least.

Life after: so what after a P.hD in india? you spent 5 years working hard in front of a terminal and here you are. The placements are very good for people in CSE and Electrical but pathetic for the other departments. It starting salary of a Chemical Engg. P.hD would be 7-8 lacs which is way below the opportunity cost lost. During those 5 years they couldhave earned min 5*5=25 lacs plus 2-3 promotions.
The only avenue that you have now is getting on a CSIR lab or become a prof. There is hardly any industry opening.

I believe that rather that advertising about their research areas the faculty should look into these problem which have a greater weightage in the minds of a young graduate at the turning point of their life.