On path of science

“The future belongs to science and those who make friends with science,” India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, once said. As the country celebrates the 75 years of Independence, it’s time we introspected whether our scientific and technological developments touched the lives of common people and whether Indians became a friend of science.

Since 1947, the country has emerged as a global power in space technology, nuclear power, and many other fields. Our probes to the moon and Mars, nuclear weapons, and strategic missile systems undoubtedly are praiseworthy achievements. Equally fabulous are our self-sufficiency in foodgrain, medicines, and vaccines, and exemplary developments in communications and information technology. 

In the latest Global Innovation Index 2021, India ranked 46 among 132 countries, two notches above its 2020 position; in 2019, it ranked 52. India overperformed on innovation relative to its level of development for the 11th year in a row.

The country is also among the top destinations for dealmaking (it ranked 5th among the centres of global dealmaking -- dominated by technology transactions -- in the 2021 EY Global Capital Confidence Barometer survey).

All this is the result of unrelenting efforts of the government, science and technology institutions (such as Indian Space Research Organisation, Indian Institutes of Technology, and Indian Institute of Science), entrepreneurs, scientists, academicians, and numerous others.

The country gained pace in scientific innovation after Independence. The Planning Commission was set up in 1950 and the first plan draft, presented in July 1951, included a chapter on “Scientific and Industrial Research”; it recognised 11 research institutes at the national level in a bid to lay the foundation of scientific research in the country. 

India’s first major science policy can be traced back to the Scientific Policy Resolution, 1958, which realised “it is only through the scientific approach and method and the use of scientific knowledge that reasonable material and cultural amenities and services can be provided for every member of the community”. 

And such a policy helped the Green Revolution. In the mid-1960s, after two successive years of drought, India was dependent on wheat imports and stared at yet another famine. Until then, Indian farming had remained largely unchanged for a few centuries and seeds cultivated had a genetic makeup that went back thousands of years. The scenario drastically improved after M S Swaminathan -- the father of the Indian Green Revolution -- started to teach Indian farmers to effectively increase yield with the help of high-yielding wheat and rice varieties, fertilisers, and advanced farming techniques.

In 2021-22, India’s farm exports touched a record $50.21 billion. The country is among the 15 leading exporters of agricultural products.

India's emergence as the “pharmacy of the world” is another golden chapter. Local firms supply affordable drugs and vaccines to not only developing but also developed countries. Amid the Covid pandemic, it became the fulcrum of global vaccine supply, especially to poorer nations, even as the so-called technologically advanced countries struggled to meet the demand. 

Hugely successful vaccination drives in the country -- from against smallpox, to polio, and now Covid, besides the ongoing Mission Indradhanush -- are prime examples of Indians’ trust in modern sciences. 

Any discussion on India’s scientific development shall be incomplete without the mention of its IT industry and telecom revolution. Services firms in India, according to reports, are targeting record $350-billion exports in the current financial year, up 37 per cent year-on- year, despite global headwinds and recession fears in the US and Europe. It constantly ranks among the top three commercial services exporters, thanks to the telecommunication revolution in large parts.

From allowing domestic software firms to become globally competitive in the 1990s to becoming the foundation of Digital India, its evolving jobs landscape, and socio-economic development, the impact of telecom is visible across the nation. As India prepares for the 5th generation cellular technology, the role of the telecommunications industry shall become even more crucial because of 5G’s applications in the internet of things and machine-to-machine domains.

But not everything is hunky dory on the country’s scientific front. According to a study by the NITI Aayog and the Institute for Competitiveness, India has among the lowest research and development (R&D) expenditures. Its R&D spending has decreased -- from 0.8 per cent of gross domestic product in 2008-09 to 0.7 per cent in 2017-18. It has the lowest gross domestic expenditure on R&D (GERD) among BRICS countries; GERD for Brazil, Russia, China, and South Africa are 1.2 per cent, 1.1 per cent, over 2 per cent, and 0.8 per cent, respectively. The global average is 1.8 per cent.

In his last Independence Day speech, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the National Hydrogen Mission in a bid to make India energy independent by 2047 and also meet its climate targets. None is possible without further investment and technological development. This year on National Science Day, he tweeted: "... Let us reaffirm our commitment towards fulfilling our collective scientific responsibility and leveraging the power of science for human progress."

Indians have become a friend of science, it’s time we leveraged its power.