From: mmurali@ntuix.ntu.ac.sg (Murali Damodaran)
Subject: Re: Nobel Prize & IITs
Organization: Nanyang Technological University - Singapore
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1992 02:24:13 GMT


...Another relevant article on brain drain etc -from India-D

 
Date: 04 Oct 1992 15:07:28 -0400 (EDT)
From: SRIDHAR%APCVAX@SSCVAX.CIS.MCMASTER.CA
Subject: My $ 0.02 worth on Brain Drain.
 
	Dear Editor and fellow members of this network,
 
	Recently, people have been suggesting that one possible solution to
brain drain is by compensating with money. I agree in the sense that brain
drain should be compensated, but it should be more in the form of service (pref-
erably) rather than cash. Indians should be asked to serve for India for some
years before they can leave.
 
I have seen coupla articles when I was in India with some interesting facts.
Unfortunately I do not have them except for the one I am posting now which
discusses the issue in general. I remember reading one article in India in a
general science magazine (Science India or something like that) in one of
the issues of Feb/Mar/Apr 1990. This article had lots of facts about the
amount of brain drain and how much it has affected Indias technical growth
and how much it has supplemented USAs growth. Perhaps, some one who has
access to Indian Science magazines can hunt for it.
 
	I would like to share this article I had picked up a long time
ago (TOI-N.Delhi 22 June, 1991).  Sorry for the typo and please have your
opinions sent only to the  network and not to me as my mailbox is already full.
 
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		POLICY CHANGES CAN CURB BRAIN DRAIN
			By Amrik Singh
 
Now that a new govt. has come to power, it is time to rescue the Ramamurthi
Committee and its recommendations from obscurity and project them as something
that needs serious consideration.
 
While dicussing the brain drain problem, the committee has sought to draw
a parallel with a relatively unknown contemporary situation. Even a
developed conuntry like France has a law where no highly trained individual
can seek a job outside the country until he has worked for three years.
However, students in some of our elite institutions begin to apply abroad
towards the end of their course and as soon as they finish, they are ready to
leave. Initially, almost everybody goes with the intention of pursuing
higher studies. A substantial number of them, however stay on. No concrete
figures are available in this regard though some data on how many leave the
country is available.
 
	IIT's SURVEY
The IITs in Madras and Bombay conducted a survey and the general indication was
that something like 40% of IIT graduates migrates to US. This figure conceals
as much as it reveals. There are certain branches of engineering,
civil engineering for instance, where students find it difficult to go abroad.
But there are other branches like electronics and computer where the proportion
of those who settle abroad is almost equivalent to three quarters of the
output.
 
But the issue is what kind of educational system do we have where the best of
our talent is not only enabled but in a sense encouraged to go abroad. The kind
of training imparted in the IITs enables the students to fit in the US system
and that of other developed countries and, by the same token, most of them are
more or less disqualified for employment within the country.
 
This has a good deal to do with the state of our industry, the manner in which
it has been promoted over the years and its reluctance to adjust to the
changing need of international competition. Our educational policies at that
level are attuned to the needs and imperatives of the American economy.
Consequently, when these students go into the market they do not find it easy
to adjust. The IIT review committee which reported three or four years ago
had something, though not a great deal, to say about it. Incidentally, one of
the recommendations of Ramamurthy committee is that its report should be
seriously implemented.
 
In the new political phase into which we are now entering, can one look
forward to some kind of a shift? It is difficult to be categorical. However,
there is reason to be optimistic. A few things by way of an agenda of action in
this regard may be considered.
 
(a)If France, a highly industrialised country can ban fresh gradautes leaving
the country for three years, it stands to reason that we should do so far at
least five years. In doing so, we must keep in mind the likely repercussions.
 
(b)Of several fall-outs some have been discussed by the IIT review committee but
much more planning will have to be done before such decisions can be enforced.
Such a shift in policy would have implications not only in regard to admissions
but also in regard to the preferences of students for various branches of
engineering and so on.
 
(c)The staff of the IITs is most likely to resist any such shift. Most of them
have been educated in the US and know that system better than any other system.
In a sense they are a formidable block of opinion and constitute a kind of
lobby against change. Unless they fall in line with the proposed changes, it
would be both difficult and dangerous to carry them through.
 
(d)None of these changes can be thought of or executed without close interaction
with industry. The profile of Indian industry has been changing of late and is
likely to undergo further changes. While the lead time in the case of industry
is a couple of years, in the case of education it is four to five years. That
being so, a good deal of spadework would have to be done so as to devise a plan
of action which is acceptable to the IIT academics as also to the captains of
the industry.
 
(e)What is stated about the IITs would equally apply to IIMs (which incidentally
are proposed to be reviewed in the near future), the AIIMS and several other
elite institutions.
 
	FRENCH EXAMPLE
 
It should not be necassary to got into further details except to call attention
to one fact. As already stated, France is a highly developed country and
if it felts threatened by the act of some of its talented people migrating,
surely in our case it should cause as much, if not greater, alarm. But we
refuse to recognise the problem or even confront it (I SEE A GOOD EXAMPLE
IN INDIA-D MEMBERS INCLUDING ME). Perhaps a certain number of us also connive
at it. The rates at which we are losing talent to other countries is
unbelievable.
 
A related fact should also be taken into account. France is not an English
speaking country. If a man or woman migrates to the US, he or she has to learn
English. In other word for a French person to migrate to US is much more
difficult than for an India. We operate in English and are a part of the
Anglo-Saxon network. If we wish to curb what may be called the continuing
brain drain, we will have to make a much bigger effort than France. Not only
would it amount to reframing the entire spectrum of technical education, it
would alos have other consequential fallouts like how much we charge the
students and so on.
***********************END OF ARTICLE******************************************
Extracted 
From India Interest Group Digest
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* Murali Damodaran, Sch. of MPE    <> Internet: mmurali@ntuix.ntu.ac.sg     *
* Nanyang Technological University <> Bitnet  : mdamodaran@ntuvax           *
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