Setting standards

Dr Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of India has recently expressed concern over the ‘decline in standards of research in universities including the IITs’.

He observed that China and South Korea have leapfrogged ahead of India in their mastery over science and technology. (Hindustan Times, October 7, 2006)

Interestingly, the Prime Minister chose to give the examples of China and South Korea to make his points. No harm, if that motivates.

However, what does harm, is the lack of standards, at least in the centres of educational and technological excellence, to measure their success.

In a similar context, it would be interesting to understand the research trends in geomatics in the country.

So should we only aim to keep pace with other countries?

Why not aspire for Nobel prizes? Why not for inventions?

And if that happens, the nation might like to embrace the academic arrogance with a sense of arrogance.