The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) has expressed pain over the “unfounded and motivated” attack against the institution, especially its head R.K. Pachauri, in a leading U.K. newspaper.
The December 20 article alleged that the TERI maintained close links with the Tata Group and helped it develop its carbon trading business worldwide.
In a rejoinder, nine Fellows of the TERI said the Tatas did enjoy the envious reputation of establishing institutions of excellence, including the TERI which was started as the Tata Energy Research Institute. As the TERI’s interests went beyond energy to encompass natural resources, it decided in 2001 to retain the acronym TERI, but call itself The Energy and Resources Institute. It was ridiculous to suggest that TERI was a company about money and did not ever publish its accounts because it was registered under the Societies Act and submitted detailed an audited account to the government, they said.
As for the article questioning Mr. Pachauri’s professional competence and credentials, the letter said he headed TERI for two decades with great success and contributed substantially to its becoming an internationally recognised research institute of excellence. In recognition of this effort and the work of the scientists under his leadership, the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2008.
The letter, signed by S. Sundar, R.K. Batra, C. Dasgupta, Prodipto Ghosh, Ashok Jaitly, K. Ramanathan, J.L. Bajaj, Nitin Desai and Prabir Sengupta, demanded an unqualified apology from the newspaper for the “libellous” piece of journalism, failing which the institute would take recourse to other measures it would deem appropriate.
