An Indian Scientist’s Dream

Posted on March 25, 2012 by indra

I adore R. A. Mashlekar, the former Director General of CSIR. He is a scientist. He is a good writer too, on the subject of general interest. Recently, a book of his writings and speeches- ‘Reinventing India’ got published. I tried to get a copy from the bookshops here in Noida, but couldn’t succeed. One bookshop asked me about the publisher’s name. I found out the publisher was not the popular one such as Penguin or some big foreign name, but one from Pune who publishes mainly the books in vernacular. I couldn’t obtain the book. Perhaps, it is out of stock at the moment. I couldn’t understand why Mashlekar selected the Pone publisher and not one of the better known one.

During my stay in US in 2010, I had gone through the article on innovation written by Mashlekar with Late CK Prahalad in HBR where I came across the concept of Gandhian Innovation. RA Mashlekar always inspires.

I have also a dream to see India as a super power through innovations. I wish to see a day when all working persons from the paddy fields to the R&D centres understand and contribute with some innovations. At least some will be real breakthroughs that will make India visible in global arena. And for that I would have liked the inclusion of an easy-to-understand course material on entrepreneurship and innovation for school final stage.

But let me provide here the dream of R.A. Mashlekar that appeared in one of his writings.

What would be my dream for Indian Science and India in the early part of the new millennium, say for the twenty first century?Obviously, it is of an India, where the basic needs of the teeming millions will be fulfilled and we will move on to the top ladder of the World Human Development Index.

What would be the possiblethat Indian Science & India will get in the next century? In my dream,I surfedthe net and landed at the India.com portal.

I clicked on ‘ Nobel Awards’, and I saw
‘Indians won three Nobel prizes this year. The first one in physics is for the grand unified theory of matter and their interactions. The second one is in Physiology and medicine, for providing the first definitive neuro-biological basis ofthe humancognitive phenomena. The third Nobel Prize in economics was sharedby an Indian Scientist and Indian economist working in India, a country, which has already assumed the position of a knowledge super power by capturing 30% share of the global output of the global knowledge industry. They won the Nobel Prizefor their work in Economics of Traditional knowledge, which beautifully blended economics, science, philosophy and ethics.

I clicked on‘Community Health’, and I saw
India became the first country in the world to completely eradicate Tuberculosis.

One more click on‘Indian Pharma Industry’ showed
‘The anti-ulcer drug, whichwas basedon a molecule derived from the clues from India’s traditional knowledge, maintained its leading global position andposted global sales exceeding five billion dollars.‘

I clicked on ‘Water’, and I saw
‘ Through a sustained effort of Indian scientists, engineers and technocrats, India has succeeded in creating a unique ‘Indian Water Network’, which connects all the Indian rivers and through innovative methods of water capture, recharge of aquifers etc., Indiabecame the first country in the world to reach perpetual ‘Water Security’.

A further click on ‘Disaster Management’ showed
‘ The recent earthquake on eightRichter scale in Assam had zero loss oflife, thanksto the advanced warning systems developed by Indian scientists and immaculate disaster management systems set up by the Indian government.’

One more click on ‘Energy‘ showed‘ The Prime Minister ofIndia, during the inaugural session of the 100th ‘ Indian Knowledge Congress’, formerly known as ‘ Indian Science Congress’ formally released the Indian technology to harness the massive gas hydrates in the Indian oceans, which will cater to the Indian energy needs for the next two hundred years’.

And the final click on ‘Research Opportunities’ showed ‘Indian brain drain has been completely reversed this year. In fact India is in an enviable position of having a queue American and European scholars to join its unique global knowledge production centres in India’.

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Ashoka Lives through his Edicts

Posted on March 23, 2012 by indra

2012-03-23
12:46:38 pm

A Tribute to Ashoka on Bihar Divas

FlipKart has become my favourite e-shop for books. Recently after getting first Chanakya Chant, I got Ashoka, and then Mudrarakhash, a Hindi translation of Bishakhadutt drama on the historical story of Chanakya.

I have finished reading Ashoka by Charles Allen today. Allen Turner very rightly propounds, “Ashoka may be said to be India’s founding father, being the first ruler to forge India into a single nation state. Emperor Ashoka espoused non-violence and the utterly novel concept of conquest by moral force alone-and he was very probably the first ruler in history to establish a welfare state.”

The main characters of the books, Chanakya, Chandragupta Maurya and Ashoka have been my heroes for years. The source materials for Chandragupta Maurya are Puranas, Megasthanes’ Indica, Kautilya’s Arthshastra and ‘Mudraraksha’. Megasthenes, the ambassador of Seleucus I in the court of Chandragupta Maurya authored Indica. Later writers such as Arrian, Strabo, Diodorus, and Pliny refer to Indica in their works. To Greeks, Chandragupta is known as Sandrokyptos, Sandrokottos or Androcottus.

Allen’s ‘Ashoka’ is a superbly written story how the hardworking British officers of East India Company dug out the historical personalities of Ashoka, Chandragupta and Chanakya that got lost in Indian history from the debris.

The missionary zeal of the British officers along with their official assignments took interest in revealing the puzzles of the Indian history too through excavations. Allen has covered the archeological discoveries of every object related to Ashoka from all over India and even Sri Lanka.

The source materials for Ashoka’s story are the early Buddhist scriptures and historical literature from Shri Lanka and Ashoka’s edicts on rocks and pillars that he himself got inscribed during his reign almost all over his empire.
A Map of Ashoka Empire

Megasthenes, the ambassador of Seleucus I in the court of Chandragupta Maurya authored Indica. Later writers such as Arrian, Strabo, Diodorus, and Pliny refer to Indica in their works. To Greeks, Chandragupta is known as Sandrokyptos, Sandrokottos or Androcottus

But Allen has covered the discovery of each of the major pillars and rock edicts-major as well as minor more than thirty or so and how the written content was deciphered and finally they did also come across the name of the person who got them inscribed.

“In Pillar Edict 2 Ashoka even asks rhetorically, ‘what constitutes Dharma?’ and sums it up as ‘little evil, much good, kindness, generosity, truthfulness and purity’=to which he adds from Rock Edict 1,’much self0examination, much respect, much fear (of evil) and much enthusiasm’. Not so much as a word about prayers, offerings, sacrifices, rituals or gods.”

And on Ashoka’s secular approach, Allen refers to Pillar Edict 6, ‘I have honoured all religions with various honours’, and Pillar Edict 7, ‘My DharmaMahamatras too are occupied with various good works among the ascetics and householders of all religions’.
Ashoka ends Pillar Edict 7 with closing words:

“Beloved-of-Gods says: Wherever there are stone pillars or some slabs, there this Dharam edict is to be engraved so that it may long endure. It has been engraved so that it may endure as long as my sons and great grandsons live and as long as the sun and the moon shine, and so that people may practice it as instructed. For by practicing it happiness will be attained in this world and the next.”

Allen has also written a chapter on the burning of the Nalanda library. Nalanda had exhaustive repository of Buddhist knowledge in the world, housed in three multi-storied libraries: the Ratnasagara, the Ratnadadhi and the Ratnaranjaka. “Muhammad Bakhtaiyar sent a messenger to enquire if Nalanda’s libraries contained a copy of the Quran. On learning that they did not, he ordered the destruction and put the entire site, extending over many acres, to the torch. The task of burning the library took several months.”

Allen’s book in his note provides another story: “The last known eyewitness of the fate of Nalanda was a Tibetan monk named Dharamaswamin. Arriving at Nalanda in the year 1235, he found just one survivor, a ninety-year-old monk named Rahul Sribhadra who was teaching a small class of acolytes from a Sanskrit grammar- the only manuscript to have survived the great fire. Dharamaswamin stayed on to study, only for the class to break up in panic when it was reported that Turk raiders were heading their way. Dharamaswamin carried his elderly teacher into hiding, and when the two returned to Nalanda they found the rest of the class had fled. Having taught Dharamaswamin all he knew, the aged monk handed him his copy of the Sanskrit grammar and told him to return to Tibet.”

How can any religion preach heinous task of burning books with various types of knowledge and literature, or sculpture, and architectural wonders that causes irreparable damage?

Perhaps Mauryas were the most secular of the kings. Chandragupta Maurya started with Brahmin Chanakya, but later on followed Jain Guru. Ashoka too started with Brahmin, the grandson of Chanakya, Radhagupta but ended with Buddhism.
What could have been a better subject to write on Bihar Divas?

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Why is Bihar a state with most poor?

Posted on March 22, 2012 by indra

In rural Bihar, nearly two out of three people from the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes are poor. According to Planning Commission data, poverty among casual labourers in urban areas of Bihar is 86%. Poverty has declined only marginally in Bihar, while according to data released Monday by India’s Planning Commission, the number of people living in absolute poverty in India decreased by 12.5% between 2004-2005 and 2009-2010.

Bihar government under Nitish Kumar has earned or managed a good media reporting about the significant developments in the state. Nitish Kumar also claims reduction in migration of Bihari labour to other states. I couldn’t appreciate Nitish asserting in a recent Delhi’s rally to celebrate the centenary of Bihar: “Delhi will come to halt if Biharis stop work.” Every Bihari who lives and works outside Bihar has an additional responsibility of not doing anything that undermines the image of the state in any way. Nitish Kumar must help in making Biharis a little more responsible. Why should the locals in metros look at Biharis the way the Britishers used to see the immigrant Indians in UK.

It is unfortunate that Bihar and its government do neither educate sufficiently nor train its employable population to get an honourable job. They go out as raw human resource to work as menial worker or for higher education to become employable. I don’t know in such a condition how the government or its chief should take credit for those working outside. Why can’t the government train a large number of its poor even as drivers so that they don’t start as cleaner or khalasi and wait for years to get trained as drivers at the mercy of their employers or co-working drivers?

The government has hardly taken any initiative to create productive jobs in the villages, when in reality a large number of jobs have vanished because of the use of machines in farming such as tractors and even harvesters. And interestingly, the operators of these machines come from outside the village that owns them. Why are the young men and women not interested in taking up the milk business in the villages of Bihar even with all types of assistance?

The government would have started vocational training for the boys and girls in every school or every panchayat to make the rural human resources skilled and encourage grassroots entrepreneurs to become vendors organizing the skilled women in working groups for the traders and marketers of the state as well as for those of other states.

Why wheat should is ground or paddy is dehusked only in big mills in towns? Why should some village men not get trained in repairing of the agricultural machinery or other appliances in used in plenty these days in the villages? Why should not the pickles or fluffed rice be produced and sourced from rural regions?

The state ministry of rural development must work for creating work for all those able bodied men and women in the villages instead of thinking about engaging some in only MNREGA projects.

The state has neglected the higher education, both in quality and quality, which makes the educated youth employable inside the state and outside. When all other states such as Andhra Pradesh and very recently UP have created huge capacity with large number of professional colleges of engineering, medicines, and law, Bihar has not made any attempt in that direction. And that was the reason of the growth of IT industry in those states and today that is the reason that Bihar can’t employ the professionally educated youths even after their education.

Bihar will remain poor and the poverty will not reduce, if the government doesn’t change it way of looking at the problem in very innovative way. The migrated labour will keep on remitting money for the sustenance of their family members, and the other members in family will keep on living at the mercy of middle men and getting some government doles.

With the farmers of Bihar working hard to reach the global yield benchmarks of paddy and potato, it is the government and entrepreneurs must come out with ideas to add value to these outputs and create employment right in the villages. Food processing must reach every village for value addition.

I don’t think Bihar will ever be able to reduce its poverty figure with MNREGA mentality and if the chief minister keeps on raising the figures of the poor families in the state to get more aids from the centre.

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Indian American Scientists: 2012 Sloan Research Fellows

Posted on March 19, 2012 by indra

2012-03-19

With 11 of a total family of 13 members in US and five going in American schools, I always wish that some of them will be pursuing R&D after higher education. With such dreams, naturally I get excited with the news of the achievements of Indian American scientists.

“Today’s Sloan Research Fellows are tomorrow’s Nobel Prize winners,” said Sloan Foundation president Paul L. Joskow.

Awarded annually since 1955, the fellowships, which include a $50,000 grant to be used to further a recipient’s research, have traditionally recognized those working in chemistry, computer science, economics, mathematics, evolutionary and computational molecular biology, neuroscience, and physics.

The award of 2012 Sloan Research Fellows was one such news with a number of Indian American young scientists.:

Tulika Bose, assistant professor at Boston University, received her Ph.D. in experimental high energy physics from Columbia University in 2006. Her post-doctoral research at Brown University focused on direct searches for new phenomena at the DO experiment at the Fermilab Tevatron and at the Compact Muon Solenoid experiment at the CERN Large Hadron Collider.

Neal K Dalal, assistant professor of astronomy at the University of Illinois, received his doctorate in astronomy from the University of California, San Diego, in 2002. He received a Hubble Fellowship from the Space Telescope Science Institute and was a senior research associate at the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics before he joined the faculty at the U of I in 2011.

Neil K. Garg, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry at UCLA, received his Ph.D. in 2005 from the California Institute of Technology. He completed his training as an NIH postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Irvine, and later joined UCLA in 2007. His research program at UCLA focuses on the development of synthetic strategies and methods as well as the synthesis of bioactive molecules.

Shwetak N Patel, an assistant professor in the department of computer science and engineering and electrical engineering at the University of Washington, received his Ph.D. in computer science from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 2008. His most recent research focuses on building low-cost sensing systems for the home.

Parag Pathak, associate professor of economics at MIT and research associate in the NBER’s pro¬grams on Education, Public Economics and Industrial Organization, received his A.B., S.M. and Ph.D. in 2007 from Harvard University. His research focuses on evaluating student assignment systems and has helped with New York City and Boston school assignment mechanisms.

Prasad Raghavendra, assistant professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, received his Ph.D. from the computer science and engineering department at University of Washington, Seattle. He received his dual degree in computer science from IIT Madras. His research interests include approximation algorithms, hardness of approximation, complexity, and coding theory.

Srinivas Raghu, assistant professor of the department of physics at Stanford University, received his Ph.D. in physics from Princeton University in 2006. His research interests include theoretical condensed matter physics, unconventional superconductivity, correlated electron systems, and topological phases of matter.

Sohini Ramachandran, assistant professor of biology, ecology and evolutionary biology at Brown University, received her Ph.D. from Stanford University in biological sciences in 2007. There, she worked on human population genetics. Ramachandran was elected to the Harvard Society of Fellows in 2007 and did postdoctoral work while studying coalescent theory.

Sylvia Ratnasamy, assistant professor of computer science at the University of California, Berkeley, received her Ph.D. in computer science from UC Berkeley in 2002. As a second-year Ph.D. student, she was appointed to the ICSI Center for Internet Research, in Berkeley.

With a population of Indian Americans constantly increasing, more and more of its next generation will get into the domain of expanding the Human Knowledge for the interest of human race,

Let us congratulate the winners of 2012 Sloan Research Fellowship..

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Indian Scientists and Technocrats- Winners of Infosys Prize

Posted on March 16, 2012 by indra

I recently came across a special listing of the most powerful Indians in 2012 by Indian Express. Surprisingly, it also carried the name of top ten Indians in different fields such as administrators, opinion makers, sports persons, economists, ad gurus, entertainers, fund managers, legal luminaries, activists, doctors, philanthropists. However, I could find a list of top ten scientists, technocrats, or mathematicians in the issue.

Infosys however, had initiated Infosys Prizes since 2008. Infosys Prizes are given every year for the scientists and technocrats for their outstanding contributions and carry a gold medal, a citation and a purse of Rs 50 Lakh. Those award winners are certainly the best and icons in their fields.

1.Prof. Kalyanmoy Deb, winner of 2011 in Engineering and Computer Sciences category, a Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering from IIT Kharagpur in 1985: Deb got his award for for his contributions to the emerging field of Evolutionary Multi-objective Optimization (EMO) that has led to advances in non-linear constraints, decision uncertainty, programming and numerical methods, computational efficiency of large-scale problems and optimization algorithms. (Infographic to understand it a little more)

2.Prof. Sriram Ramaswamy, winner of 2011 in Physical sciences category, had his schooling at the Modern School, Barakhamba Road, New Delhi. He is currently Professor of Physics at the Center for Condensed Matter Theory in the Department of Physics at the Indian Institute of Science.His award was for his pioneering work in the field of active matter that enables a detailed exploration into several aspects of the collective behavior of living systems as interacting mechanical entities with distributed input and dissipation of energy. (Infographic)

3.Dr. Imran Siddiqi, winner of 2011 in Life science category, M.Sc. in Chemistry by the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, in 1981 is a fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences. His award was for his breakthrough contributions to the basic understanding of clonal seed formation in plants which can be applied to revolutionize agriculture, especially in the developing world. (infographic)

4.Prof. Kannan Soundararajan, winner of 2011 in mathematical sciences category, for his path breaking work in analytic number theory and development of new techniques to study critical values of general zeta functions to prove the Quantum Unique Ergodicity Conjecture for classical holomorphic forms.(Infogrphic)

5.Prof. Ashutosh Sharma, winner of 2010 in Engineering and Computer Science category, of Chemical Engineering Department,Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur It was in recognition of his fundamental contributions to the fields of surfaces and interfaces, adhesion, pattern formation, nanocomposites, materials science, and hydrodynamics, which have practical applications in such areas as energy storage, filtration, micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) and optoelectronics.

6.Prof. Sandip Trivedi, winner of 2010 in Physical Sciences category, of Theoretical Physics Department, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai. got the Infosys Prize for finding an ingenious way to solve two of the most outstanding puzzles of Superstring Theory simultaneously: What is the origin of dark energy of the Universe? Why is there no massless scalar particle?

7.Dr. Chetan E. Chitnis, winner of 2010 in Life Sciences category, of Master of Science degree in Physics at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, Principal Leader Malaria Group, International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB), Delhi He was awarded for his pioneering work in understanding the interactions of the malarial parasite and its host, leading to the development of a viable malaria vaccine.

8.Prof. Chandrashekhar Khare, winner of 2010 in Mathematical Sciences category, Mathematics Department,University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in recognition of his fundamental contributions to Number Theory, particularly his solution of the Serre conjecture.

9.Prof. Thanu Padmanabhan, winner in 2009 in Physical Sciences category, Distinguished Professor at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune, India.

10.Prof. K VijayRaghavan, winner in 2009 in Life Sciences category, Senior Professor in Developmental Genetics and Director of National Centre of Biological Sciences, Bangalore India.

11.Prof. Ashoke Sen, winner in 2009 in mathematical sciences category, currently a Professor at the Harish-Chandra Research Institute, Allahabad. His area of research is String Theory and was recognized for his important contributions to String Theory, which is a vital part of Mathematical Physics today.

12.Prof. Manindra Agrawal, winner in 2008 in Mathematical sciences category, his outstanding contribution in the field of complexity theory, a branch of mathematics and computer science concerned with the study of algorithms for solving mathematical and related scientific problems, and especially their efficiency and running times.

Can these distinguished scientists and technocrats be the icons to the students’ community going for higher education in reputed institutions such as IITs, NITs or BITS to allure them to the business of R&D and contribute to make India a knowledge economy? Let me assure them that most of them will not be disappointed about their achievements from the career.

I recently came across a special listing of the most powerful Indians in 2012 by Indian Express. Surprisingly, it also carried the name of top ten Indians in different fields such as administrators, opinion makers, sports persons, economists, ad gurus, entertainers, fund managers, legal luminaries, activists, doctors, philanthropists. However, I could find a list of top ten scientists, technocrats, or mathematicians in the issue.

Infosys however, had initiated Infosys Prizes since 2008. Infosys Prizes are given every year for the scientists and technocrats for their outstanding contributions and carry a gold medal, a citation and a purse of Rs 50 Lakh. Those award winners are certainly the best and icons in their fields.

1.Prof. Kalyanmoy Deb, winner of 2011 in Engineering and Computer Sciences category, a Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering from IIT Kharagpur in 1985: Deb got his award for for his contributions to the emerging field of Evolutionary Multi-objective Optimization (EMO) that has led to advances in non-linear constraints, decision uncertainty, programming and numerical methods, computational efficiency of large-scale problems and optimization algorithms. (Infographic to understand it a little more)

2.Prof. Sriram Ramaswamy, winner of 2011 in Physical sciences category, had his schooling at the Modern School, Barakhamba Road, New Delhi. He is currently Professor of Physics at the Center for Condensed Matter Theory in the Department of Physics at the Indian Institute of Science.His award was for his pioneering work in the field of active matter that enables a detailed exploration into several aspects of the collective behavior of living systems as interacting mechanical entities with distributed input and dissipation of energy. (Infographic)

3.Dr. Imran Siddiqi, winner of 2011 in Life science category, M.Sc. in Chemistry by the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, in 1981 is a fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences. His award was for his breakthrough contributions to the basic understanding of clonal seed formation in plants which can be applied to revolutionize agriculture, especially in the developing world. (infographic)

4.Prof. Kannan Soundararajan, winner of 2011 in mathematical sciences category, for his path breaking work in analytic number theory and development of new techniques to study critical values of general zeta functions to prove the Quantum Unique Ergodicity Conjecture for classical holomorphic forms.(Infogrphic)

5.Prof. Ashutosh Sharma, winner of 2010 in Engineering and Computer Science category, of Chemical Engineering Department,Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur It was in recognition of his fundamental contributions to the fields of surfaces and interfaces, adhesion, pattern formation, nanocomposites, materials science, and hydrodynamics, which have practical applications in such areas as energy storage, filtration, micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) and optoelectronics.

6.Prof. Sandip Trivedi, winner of 2010 in Physical Sciences category, of Theoretical Physics Department, Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Mumbai. got the Infosys Prize for finding an ingenious way to solve two of the most outstanding puzzles of Superstring Theory simultaneously: What is the origin of dark energy of the Universe? Why is there no massless scalar particle?

7.Dr. Chetan E. Chitnis, winner of 2010 in Life Sciences category, of Master of Science degree in Physics at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, Principal Leader Malaria Group, International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB), Delhi He was awarded for his pioneering work in understanding the interactions of the malarial parasite and its host, leading to the development of a viable malaria vaccine.

8.Prof. Chandrashekhar Khare, winner of 2010 in Mathematical Sciences category, Mathematics Department,University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in recognition of his fundamental contributions to Number Theory, particularly his solution of the Serre conjecture.

9.Prof. Thanu Padmanabhan, winner in 2009 in Physical Sciences category, Distinguished Professor at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune, India.

10.Prof. K VijayRaghavan, winner in 2009 in Life Sciences category, Senior Professor in Developmental Genetics and Director of National Centre of Biological Sciences, Bangalore India.

11.Prof. Ashoke Sen, winner in 2009 in mathematical sciences category, currently a Professor at the Harish-Chandra Research Institute, Allahabad. His area of research is String Theory and was recognized for his important contributions to String Theory, which is a vital part of Mathematical Physics today.

12.Prof. Manindra Agrawal, winner in 2008 in Mathematical sciences category, his outstanding contribution in the field of complexity theory, a branch of mathematics and computer science concerned with the study of algorithms for solving mathematical and related scientific problems, and especially their efficiency and running times.

Can these distinguished scientists and technocrats be the icons to the students’ community going for higher education in reputed institutions such as IITs, NITs or BITS to allure them to the business of R&D and contribute to make India a knowledge economy? Let me assure them that most of them will not be disappointed about their achievements from the career.

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The Way India Promises and Performs

Posted on March 13, 2012 by indra

India’s President while initiating the budget session, its prime minister from Red fort on Independence Day and the finance minister in his budget speech every year promise to nation many things. If the government would have kept the promises, India would have by now become a better place to live with poverty gone and prosperity all around.

As reported, ‘in fact, an analysis of the assurances given by the President in her speeches in the last three years reveals that nearly 65% of the promises remain pending’. However, it is interesting and exhilarating to go through the data on performances taken from this year’s speech, if we can take it as sanguine and not concocted. Here are some from the speech of the president this year:

1.Under the National e-Governance programme, more than 97,000 Common Service Centres have been established across the country for making public services conveniently available to citizens. Departments responsible for Income Tax, Passports, Central Excise, and Corporate Affairs have started delivering online services.
2.During the past one year, over 1.5 crore students belonging to Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes and Minorities have been awarded scholarships and fellowships.
3.The Infant Mortality Rate has declined from 58 per thousand live births in 2005 to 47 in 2010 and Maternal Mortality Ratio has declined from 254 per one lakh deliveries in 2004-2006 to 212 in 2007-2009. The Janani Suraksha Yojana registered impressive gains with 1.13 crore women benefitting during 2010-11.
4.Over the last three years there has been a 26 per cent increase in MBBS seats and 62 per cent increase in post graduate seats.
5.More than 12.46 lakh titles have been distributed under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act.
6.The agricultural sector has grown at 6.6 per cent during 2010-11, the highest growth rate recorded in recent times. The country witnessed a record production of 241.56 million tonnes of food grains during 2010-11, and achieved record production of fruits and vegetables at 231 million tonnes, pulses at 18 million tonnes, oilseeds at 31.1 million tonnes, and cotton at 33.42 million bales.
7.During the year 2011-12 the minimum support prices of selected agricultural commodities were raised by 10 to 40 per cent over the previous year.
8.Credit to agriculture reached about 4,60,000 crore in 2010-11 which is 22 per cent above the target. An interest subvention scheme was implemented to ensure the availability of crop loans to small farmers for loans up to 3 lakh at the rate of 7 per cent per annum. An additional subvention of 3 per cent is being provided to such farmers who repay their short-term crop loan in time, reducing their effective interest rate to 4 per cent.
9.In the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme, since its inception, about 1100 crore man-days of employment has been generated and nearly 1,48,000 crore has been spent . The scheme has benefitted 25 crore people so far.
10.Under the ambitious Bharat Nirman programme started in 2004, the cumulative targets of creating additional irrigation potential of 1 crore hectares, providing electricity to 1 lakh villages and 1.75 crore poor households, upgrading 1.94 lakh kilometres of existing rural roads and providing safe drinking water to identified habitations, have been achieved well before 31st March, 2012, the targeted date.
11.The number of foreign tourist arrivals in 2011-12 is around 63 lakh, an increase of 9 per cent over the previous year.
12.The e-filing of income tax returns, e-payment of taxes, ECS facility for electronic refunds directly in taxpayers’ bank accounts and electronic filing of TDS returns are now available throughout the country. A Single Window System, called Aayakar Seva Kendra, for computerized registration of all taxpayers’ applications including paper income tax returns, has been introduced.
13.India’s merchandise exports touched US$ 298 billion during 2011 registering a growth of more than 34 per cent over 2010.
14.By November, 2011, over 49000 villages had been covered for extending banking services through banks or technology based banking solutions.
15.Bharat Oman Refinery Limited, a joint venture of BPCL and Oman Oil Company with refining capacity of 6 million metric tonnes per annum, was commissioned in June 2011.
16.Today there are 76 telephone connections for every 100 persons.
17.Capacity addition for the power generation in the 11th plan period is likely to be around 52,000 MW as against 21,000 MW in the 10th plan period. In 2011-12 alone we are likely to add a record 15,000 MW.
18.Public investment in Research & Development has grown at 20 to 25 per cent each year during the 11th Plan period. Government has successfully introduced the Innovation in Science Pursuit for Inspired Research or INSPIRE scheme and more than 5 lakh science students have been given awards till now.
19.To focus on socio-economic issues of national importance that have linkage with science & technology, an Academy for Science Policy Implementation and Research or ASPIRE has been set up. The Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research has also been set up.
20.Eight satellites were launched successfully. The communication satellite GSAT-8 was put into orbit.
21.Our ambitious Pan African e-Network project has been commissioned in 47 out of 54 countries in the African continent.

The government would have provided only the yearly figures against target and not the cumulative ones to make its performance impressive. It is unethical. However, I shall like the readers to go through the president’s speech and themselves find out the galore of promises in forms of pending bills, sanctioned amount, and plans.

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Indian Scientists and Nobel Prize

Posted on March 11, 2012 by indra

Nobel Prizes have been an indicator of a country’s scientific prowess.

It was CK Prahlad who in his vision of India @75 wished India to have 10 Nobel Prize Winners by 2022.

‘Outlook’ published a list of Indian science luminaries who had potentials for the Nobel Prize in its July 14, 2003 issue. nterestingly, one in the list V. Ramakrishnan, Structural biologist, MRC Lab,shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Thomas A. Steitz and Ada E. Yonath, “for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome” and thus became the fourth Indian to become a Nobel Laureate after Raman, Chandrasekhar and Khorana.

The Outlook jury were themselves great scientists: a cellular and molecular biologist (P.M. Bhargava), an astrophysicist (Ramanath Cowsik), a space scientist (K. Kasturirangan), a chemical engineer (R.A. Mashelkar) and a physicist (M.G.K. Menon).

Vilayanur S. Ramachandran discovered the now well-known phantom limb syndrome. According to Ramachandran, ‘we’re all born with a map in the brain to which the sensory surfaces of our bodies are connected’.

C.N.R. Rao has been at the frontiers of superconductivity, buckyballs and nanoparticles.

Shrinivas R. Kulkarni discovered the millisecond pulsar—distant stars emitting very high-frequency radio waves—and has conducted stand-out observational astronomy in virtually the entire electromagnetic spectrum.

Ashoke Sen has contributed to string theory of elementary particles has, in recent times, tended to set the agenda for other researchers and his name is taken in the same breath as Schwarz’s, Witten’s and other pioneers of the field. Sen is currently working on the study of dynamics of tachyons on unstable D-branes in string theory and his findings may have interesting applications in cosmology.

K.R. Srinivasan has been working in the complex area of turbulence to peer and critical acclaim.

Abhay Ashtekar is working on revamping Einsteinian relativity in an attempt to marry it with quantum theory.

E.Premkumar Reddy: The most notable of his findings are the molecular cloning and sequence determination of a number of viral oncogenes and their cellular homologues.

Lalji Singh is a molecular biologist with areas of his research interest involves molecular basis of sex determination, DNA fingerprinting, wildlife conservation, silkworm genome analysis, human genome and ancient DNA studies.

Goverdhan Mehta, organic chemist, has made notable and outstanding contributions in Chemical Sciences and specializes in the area of Organic Chemistry.

J.V. Narlikar developed with Sir Fred Hoyle the conformal gravity theory, commonly known as Hoyle–Narlikar theory. It synthesizes Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and Mach’s Principle.
Narlikar is a proponent of the steady state cosmology.

M.S. Swaminathan, plant geneticist, known as the “Father of the Green Revolution in India”, for his leadership and success in introducing and further developing high-yielding varieties of wheat in India/

K. Vijay Raghavan, Biologist, researched on the important principles and mechanisms that control nervous system and muscles during development and how these neuromuscular systems direct specific locomotor behaviours.

G. Padmanabhan, Molecular biologist, IISc, has made significant contributions in the area of transcriptional regulation of malarial drug metabolizing genes in liver, mechanism of chloroquine action and its resistance in the parasite, new drug targets for malaria etc.

Mriganka Sur is deepening our understanding of how the brain works and the “mis-wiring” that causes mental diseaseIn that experiment he showed, for the first time, that the brain is ‘plastic’. He demonstrated how the brain changes in response to the external environment even as it continues to develop.

Jainendra Jain is known for his theoretical work on quantum many body systems, most notably for postulating Composite fermions.

Lov Grover is the originator of the Grover database search algorithm used in quantum computing.

Gurdev Khush is an agronomist and geneticist who, along with mentor Dr. Henry Beachell, received the 1996 World Food Prize for unparalleled achievements in enlarging and improving the global supply of rice during a time of exponential population growth.

The list above would have certainly not included all of those with potential to be a Nobel Laureate. The main thrust is to be on an education system that enthuses more and more to join the R&D activities in various scientific fields.

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Bihar-A Temple Project

Posted on March 10, 2012 by indra

I don’t know why such exciting news comes from BBC, Washington Post, Independent, Guardian and a score of other foreign news media. However, it adds perhaps a little weight and seems to be more authentic that makes me happy.

I still don’t know why the national newspapers and digital media didn’t cover the news or if I just failed to notice it. The news caught my sight as few months ago my son and daughter-in-law had been talking about visiting the Angkor Wat Temple complex that is world heritage site some day. “Built during the reign of Hindu King Suryavarman II, Angkor Wat is one of Cambodia’s prime tourist destinations. Spread across a sprawling campus of 203-acres, the temple was chiefly dedicated to Lord Vishnu, one of the Hindu Gods, until the late 13th century. In the years ahead, the temple became dedicated to Lord Buddha.”

The news of the grand temple plan of Acharya Kunal Kishore replicating Cambodia’s iconic 12th century Angkor Wat temple on the banks of the Ganges River near Patna was exciting: “The Angkor Wat temple in Bihar will be as majestic as the original, and slightly larger – it will be 222ft by 222ft, and its five shikharas [towers] will also be 222ft high,” according to Kishore Kunal. It will be ready in ten years and will cost at least Rs 60 crore. The news was entered by Rajesh in his face book first and today after seeing the report in Washington Post I did also expressed my excitement. Interestingly, as reported, Acharya has still not visited the original temple complex in Cambodia. I wish, he would have done it and extensively gone around and studied the details.

I got somewhat educated too with the story of Rama: “The god Ram was believed to have visited the site in the course of his journey and was welcomed by King Sumati of the Vaishali kingdom.”

Acharya has been doing a great service to projecting a positive image of Bihar. Once I wished him to put all his resources in education and healthcare of Bihar and become the inspiring force to add hundreds of professional colleges and hospitals. His breaching the caste gap through the appointment of the priests from the deprived castes for temples was exemplary.

I wish Acharya a grand success in getting realized his Angkor Wat temple project without any obstruction because of false secular fanatics or financial resources. However, I shall like the temple to become the grandest architechural feat of the world and be one day included in the list of the seven wonders of the contemporary world?

Besides Rama Temple, Acharya should plan to have at least one temple each for Lord Mahavira and Buddha, equally grand matching to the overall architecture of the temple complex. Bihar had been the land of their enlightenment and its greatest kings Chandragupta Maurya and Ashoka who could realize the concept of India by integrating the whole country.

Acharya’s trust could start the work of integrating the habitations around the temple through various schemes of village planning, educational and healthcare institutions to match the ambience and heritage of the temple complex.

Sometimes, I get skeptical thinking about another dream project-Nalanda University that was to get established in Bihar and could have become the brightest jewel in the crown of resurgent Bihar. New Nalanda University would have easily become a knowledge hub with balanced mixture of old and new style of education with a school each built by many countries and the most sought for university to join as teacher or student.

Let the people like me who may not see the project getting completed and opened to the public live the dream and enjoy.

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Indian Culture: Strength and Weaknesses

Posted on March 9, 2012 by indra

Two recent news reports might have hurt many wishers of India. While the first was a study coming from the academicians, the second might be a poor unnecessary remark of a former cricket captain.

A study, ‘India: The Next Superpower?’ by the London School of Economics (LSE) lists several challenges, that are likely to prevent India from realizing the ambitions of becoming the superpower.

Ramachandra Guha, currently the Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at the LSE, is the foremost among the LSE group. He argues and gives seven reasons why India will not become a superpower: “The challenge of the Naxalites; the insidious presence of the Hindutvawadis; the degradation of the once liberal and upright Centre; the increasing gap between the rich and the poor; the trivialisation of the media; the unsustainability, in an environmental sense, of present patterns of resource consumption; the instability and policy incoherence caused by multi-party coalition governments”

I don’t know why Ramachandra can’t realize that the people of India do realize the dangerous consequences of the present situation on all his listed factors and are evolving ways and means to overcome the drawbacks en route its growth. I shall like to give just one example of this evolution. If we remember, the election just few years ago used to be a dreadful exercise many considering that as fares with obstructing voting, looting of booths, managing counting and violence. Indian electorate today is exercising its right without any fear and trouble at polling stations and election has become perhaps fairer than that in many developed countries too. Let Ramachandra not be pessimistic rather let him suggest the ways and means to overcome the challenges. However, it is not necessary to believe in the logic of LSE intellectuals and some differs.

Second derogatory remarks came from the former captain of Australian Cricket team who also was India coach, Greg Chappell in a report:

Taking at dig at overall Indian culture Chappell said: “The culture is very different, it`s not a team culture.”

“They lack leaders in the team because they are not trained to be leaders. From an early age, their parents make all the decisions, their schoolteachers make their decisions, their cricket coaches make the decisions.”

“The culture of India is such that, if you put your head above the parapet someone will shoot it. Knock your head off. So they learn to keep their head down and not take responsibility. The Poms taught them really well to keep their head down. For if someone was deemed to be responsible, they`d get punished. So the Indians have learned to avoid responsibility. So before taking responsibility for any decisions, they prefer not to.”

I wish the former captain would not have made such remarks, and Indian cricketers must reply that in words as well as from their deeds.

Let the celebrities maintain certain amount of positivity and constraint in their inferences about India and its people.

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A Helpless Prime Minister, A Spineless Party

Posted on March 4, 2012 by indra

Why is Manmohan so helpless? Perhaps even if he wishes, he can’t resign. Why did he not agree for a JPC for 2G and in turn the whole of winter session got lost if the opposition was asking for it if the opposition was asking for it? Why did he agree for JPC and why did he and his minister keep on repeating the zero loss theory? Why didn’t he manage to get resignation from Thomas, CVC? Why was he so adamant to correct the mistake? Why would have Manmohan waited for SC to ask CVC resign? Why couldn’t Hasan Ali’s 500 billion in Swiss Banks or for that matter all the bank accounts of Indians in foreign banks be freezed if those are opened against the law of the land? How long Congress spokespersons save the party? Will the country be administrated by Supreme Court? How long the appointments of ministers and the heads of key agencies be made as per the wishes of the Nehru-Gandhi family?

Manmohan accepts fault. But the main question that haunts millions in the country, why doesn’t Manmohan resign?

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PS: I wish Shri Manmohan Singh to resign so that Sonia Gandhi can give chance to the next best, be it Pranab or PC, if Rahul Gandhi can’t take over. It is absolutely necessary for the country. Moreover, I don’t like Manmohan pretending that he matters. Can Manmohan manage to get the numbers lost by DMK or he will have to look to Sonia or Pranab? If a PM can’t manage to keep two of his own party’s ministers in good spirit, how can he be expected to keep the heavy weight like Sharad Pawar in sync with his policies? And this is the reason good enough for him to resign to save the country. Let the country understand and appreciate that the model resorted to by Sonia in 2004 has failed, though every countryman wanted it to succeed then.

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