Two weeks ago, we were hoping that the cloud of gloom covering STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering/ Education, Agriculture and Medicine) in India would be lifted soon. Alas, the budget announced recently by the government has only let the veil of gloom thicken. As Pallava Bagla described it last week ( The Hindu 6-3-2015 ), it has been more lip service than action. In the morning of the day of the budget, which incidentally was also the National Science Day, the Prime Minister’s message was: “The Government is fully committed to encouraging research, innovation and excellence, particularly among our young minds”. And the same evening, we realised that the government has increased the S&T budget by 4-7 per cent, one that hardly meets the inflation rate. Even these numbers lie, because the budgetary “increase” was based on what STEAM ministries spent last year up to December 2014 and not what they would have upto March 31, 2015, as the usual practice is! Mr. Modi has not walked the talk.
Devastating Indeed it has been a devastating budget for STEAM. The health ministry’s budget has been cut by 20 per cent. The money for the HIV programme has been cut by 30 per cent, and child health programme (India has the maximum malnourished children and nursing mothers) downsized. This has led Dr.Srinath Reddy to lament that this is akin to starving a sick child. The research arm of the health ministry, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), sees its outlay poorer this year.
Agriculture's loss Agriculture loses its budget by Rs 2,800 crores, from Rs 19,852 crores last year to 17,004 this year. Its research arm, the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) loses 25 crores this year.
Turn to the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) which handles school, college and university education, and research. It faces a 17 per cent cut. Money for school education has been cut from Rs 55,155 crores to Rs 42,210, a drop of Rs 13,000 crores. In an example of administrative jugglery, the centre has passed on the buck to the state governments (each of which demands special assistance status, claiming bankruptcy). And in higher education, the money allotted is already down by Rs 3900 crores, and much of the MHRD budget here will surely go to breast-feed the newly born dozens of ‘central universities’, IITs and IIMs, leaving established ones to their wits. Note too that MHRD covers not just S&T but also humanities and social sciences the — poor cousins. Their demands are usually far less expensive — but even these are hardly met. Should education not be on the high table?
Mr. Bagla reminds us of how the research scholars pursuing their PhD degrees, the “foot- soldiers of Indian STEAM” had gone on a Gandhian type hunger strike demanding release of the promised scholarship money. Recently it was hiked to about Rs 4 Lakhs per year. The number looks substantial, but after accounting for admission and semester fees, thesis related expenses and daily living costs, each of them has little access to the kind of 29-rupee-lunch that our parliamentarians enjoy.
Science Ministry Turn to the Science Ministry, and the situation is about the same. True, the budget provides well for mission-type programmes planned by the Space and the Atomic Energy groups. But if we look at the budgets of the Departments of Science & Technology, Science and Engineering Research Board, Department of Biotechnology, Earth Sciences and the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the picture is bleak. As mentioned above, the so called increase of 7 per cent hardly meets the inflation rate.
The CSIR is particularly in bad shape, with no Director General for the last 18 months and about 10 with no appointed directors; the stop-gap administrative solution of the senior-most scientist to act as the interim head is meaningless since he/she has no power to plan the coming year. It is, to say the least, pathetic.
Many have appreciated the budget as appropriate, suited to improve the economic situation in the country. Advice has been sought and obtained from acknowledged experts such as the Reserve Bank Governor, chief economic adviser, NITI Ayog Vice Chair, and major industry heads. Sadly though, there is at present no such group pitching in for STEAM. Should we not make friends with science, just as we have done with economics?
Beyond government It is time for us to go beyond the government for support. Two groups that have remained beneficiaries of whatever little the government has done towards education, R&D and done very well are private industry and the NRI community. It is time they think of contributing to India’s efforts in R&D in STEAM, humanity and social sciences. Elsewhere in the world, private industry and individual business magnates have set up their own R&D Foundations which offer competitive grants. Indian tycoons, many richer than the government, need to go beyond “corporate social responsibility” and set up R&D funds. Can bodies such as FICCI, CII, NASSCOM and ASSOCHAM initiate similar grants? And let such funds be managed in collaboration with science academies and similar scholarly groups with domain expertise to disburse them.
The second group The second group is that of the Non-Resident Indians, who have had their early training in India, and have since worked hard to become success stories. And they have concerns about India’s future. Why should they not start a not-for-profit R&D fund to help India’s STEAM? (I recall how such a thing has happened with Israel). Such a fund, with an annual budget of, say, US $ 1 billion, will go a long way to accelerate the growth and improvement in India’s STEAM and education. Is Barkis willing?
D. BALASUBRAMANIAN
dbala@lvpei.org
