A research idea, or a career, is a tender sapling that needs nurturing to grow and bear fruit. Young researchers, struggling to find a foothold in the world of research, often have to make a difficult choice: between subjecting a young idea to the dangers of meeting an ignominious end by leaving it where it was born, and taking it far far away from its native context in order to give it a fair chance of survival.
Let’s accept it that the environment in our country is extremely unfriendly for a young research career to safely grow: starting with scanty resources, to corruption, to politics, to social pressures to a variety of prejudices the world has about us, the hurdles to breaking the glass ceiling are so many that the future of many a bright research career are asphyxiated here. No wonder, for most starry eyed bright minds, the options are limited, and choice is obvious – leave for safe havens of research.
And yet, we could probably look at things a bit differently. A curious, analytic mind with a zeal to solve problems will never feel unsafe when he has a problem to solve. And here, there are teeming problems waiting for that creative idea which will rip them away. Just that one has to be a bit less hung up about what problems he really wants to work on.
Probably, it’s not about the sapling after all, but about the place.
In the perspective, I feel that the case is rather balanced on both sides. Choice is for the individual to make. But it’s for all of us to keep talking about this subject. Even if we have made our choices, the discussion should never be over for.
About the cartoonist: Sujit did his PhD from CSA (Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore) and joined Philips. After few years in the industry he joined IIIT Bangalore as an Assistant Professor and continues to teach there. Creator of ” Lapataa”- A fictional IISCian as he dodges through the reality of PhD. It is one of the fantastic piece of art which ClubSciWri thought needs to preserved and showed to the world and other alumni. The clips connect all of us whether it is an IIScian or a non-IIScian who did their PhD in India.
http://www.iiitb.ac.in/faculty/sujit-kumar-chakrabarti
https://sites.google.com/site/sujitkc/professional2/professional-biography
©Sujit Kumar Chakrabarti
This work by ClubSciWri is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
