D Ravi Kanth: Patently in trouble

TRADING THOUGHTS

Not long ago India figured prominently on the global science and research map. An emerging pool of scientists hogged the limelight even when the country was still waging a fierce nationalist movement. Centres of scientific excellence began to take birth in different cities propelling several Indian scientists to reach new highs and receive international recognition. Several scientists in different streams "" Jagadish Chandra Bose, Prafulla Chandra Ray, C V Raman, Satyendra Nath Bose, Shanti Swaroop Bhatnagar and Homi Baba "" worked tirelessly to build a strong foundation for the "Indian Renaissance".

With a meagre expenditure of around Rs 300 towards all the laboratory equipment, C V Raman produced the molecular laws of light or the Raman Effect. Indeed, he was the first Asian to receive the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1930. India's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, treated scientists and the scientific establishment with enormous care so as to nourish the roots of what he called the "scientific temper." Nehru ensured an increase in the outlays on scientific research which resulted in the creation of a chain of laboratories.

But, 60 years after independence, India is witnessing different trends in its science and research field. Indications point towards an irreversible decline. An easy measure to judge a nation's scientific and technological progress is the scale of inventions as notified through patents.

Consider the latest figures for patent filings circulated by the Geneva-based World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO). Companies can now file patents electronically and secure rights in different targeted countries.

A record 156,100 applications for patent rights were filed last year, which is an increase of about 5 per cent over the previous year. The main message is the emergence of Korea and China as the two leading players on the global patents radar. Korea, whose science and research establishment took birth nearly 20 years after India's independence, has dislodged France as the fourth largest nation in patent filings. China, which is more comparable to India because of the size of the population and other economic indicators, took the sixth place by pushing down the Netherlands. Korea, for instance, filed 7,061 patent applications last year as compared to 5,944 in 2006, while inventors and companies from China submitted 5,456 patent applications last year as against 3,951in the previous year.

So, effectively these two east Asian countries dislodged two main patent-driven countries of western Europe. Of course, the traditional technological giants "" the US (52,280 patent filings), Japan (27,731) and Germany (18,134) "" continued their domination as the leaders in the arena of new inventions.

What about India which claims to be the powerhouse of skilled professionals in patent filings? Disturbingly, its performance has fallen during the last two years despite a proliferation of biotech and IT companies. Last year, Indian companies and inventors filed only 686 patent applications. In 2006, India had 831 filings.

India is far, far behind China at a time when its political elite want to showcase the country as a speedier runner than its neighbour in the main fields of technology "" telecommunications, information technology and pharmaceuticals "" where most patent applications were published last year. Indian companies are almost bystanders in the realm of inventions in these sectors. Another interesting facet of these patent filings is the linguistic transformation such that Japan, Korea and China are publishing in their native languages. The emerging centres of innovation in east Asia are not only transforming the geography of the patent system but also pointing to where future economic growth will occur.

In sharp contrast to the repeated hype of India as an emerging global economic giant, its performance in the arena of technological innovation doesn't suggest a healthy future. Even a small but rich nation like Switzerland, with a population of about seven million, has more patent filings than India with a billion-plus population. At a time when Indian companies are on a prowl the world over, its universities and scientific institutions are rapidly falling behind its immediate neighbour, China.

The repeated mantra of 9 per cent annual growth cannot come about without a solid technological base! With all resources and talent being hogged by the IT and management centres, there seems to be an insatiable demand to produce knowledge workers at cheap prices by neglecting fundamental sciences. Indeed, fundamental sciences are at a discount because of the growing obsession with copy-cat research centres in biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. Though Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is aware of the "decline in the standards of research work in universities and even in the IITs," there is no credible evidence to suggest that his government has attempted to reverse this trend!