Coordination and Governance of S&T Structure and Infrastructure in India

Abstract

Over several decades of developmental investments and developmental democratic public governance, India has experimented with and has evolved a very complex web of ST however, ST (2) as part of instrument/capacity build up; and (3) as part of a major national mission such as on space. Apart from the fund from line ministry, a proposing organization may seek fund from extramural facility of another ministry, or from the instrument/capacity build up funds from other line ministries. A facility such created is in general a dedicated (or laboratory) facility, not easily accessible to outside researchers or outside private parties. Fees based laboratories do exist in India but their functions are almost always limited to testing, standardization, certification areas and/or they happen to belong to public executive authorities such as on standards. Private fees based laboratories do exist at higher secondary school science level and at undergraduate levels. Infrastructure level research, experimentation facilities are yet to come up. A large number of specialized research institutes have come up over the years. The Research and Development Statistics 2007-08, from the Department of Science and Technology reported the presence of 3,960 RD especially, the number of laboratories with the CSIR constitutes less than 1% of the total number of R&D laboratories in the country. State-wise distribution, as per the DST Research and Development Statistics at a Glance 2007-08, is: Maharashtra with 835 R&D institutions, Tamil Nadu with 402, Andhra Pradesh with 338, Delhi with 321, Karnataka with 311, Gujarat with 273, West Bengal with 260, Uttar Pradesh with 223, Kerala with 139 and the rest of the states with the remaining 858 R&D institutions. The private sector has R&D departments/units with respective economic enterprises and sometimes with trusts supported by such private enterprises. Moreover, there are S&T/R&D units with several social sector NGOs/NPOs. Last few years have seen foreign companies investing in owned R&D establishments in India. Professional scientific societies or associations are weak in India relative to several advanced countries, notably the USA. Role of professional control in management of S&T organizations has remained sparse, few and far between, and is often exercised in conjunction with administrative organs and under typically governmental administrative rules, budgetary practices, cash flow managements, information channel controls, organizational processes, audit requirements as prevail in respective ministries/departments controlling the concerned S&T/R&D organization. The peer controls, the gate keeping roles and peer hand-holding or reviews etc. are naturally very weak and do accommodate administrative rules and principles. It is understood that although over the years growth of S&T infrastructure has taken place significantly, the achievements are yet to become very promising. The socio-economic sector laboratories which are expected to harness S&T for the developmental aspects of the society quite often suffer from mismatch and are expected to perform up to their expected targets. The key reasons behind such mismatch could be shifts in and softening of governance, poor S&T infrastructure including laboratories and workshops, multiplicity of S&T goals, changing S&T charters and research agenda, locked-up levels of skills and competencies of personnel, among others. Absence often of transparent coordination mechanisms or instruments renders this large structure weak. Goals multiplication and shifting charters/agenda often appears to have resulted from changes in governance structures and governance imperatives. This in turn results in a fuzzy set of expected deliverables and locked-up skills and competencies of personnel. Almost always research institutes are run under administrative rules and structures analogous to those prevailing in, and for, the line ministries. The public audit system too has very significant influence on modes of functioning and the capability to deliver. We also find that India has a huge S&T infrastructure in which there is wide variance in the governance structure. The gains from such varied structures have definitely been very impressive, however, with one caveat. Unlike a singular mode of governance where gains are defined well and beforehand and where measurement of gains are easily computable, visible and are large – the Indian web of federated democratized stakeholders-related governances have defined multiple goals, varied types of deliverables, complex modes of negotiations and regulations and the Indian governances have therefore delivered very large number of relatively inscrutable grass-roots gains that are not easily amenable to accumulation. In fact, standard instruments of direction such as laws and audit systems have accommodated, especially in the phases of implementation of S&T based developmental programs, the roles of negotiation and aspirations of the local structures of governance. The distinct gains from this very distributed mode of goals and governances are that widely distributed capacity and very diverse capabilities have been sustained and generated. This is perhaps very unique to India and few nations can be proud of such great diversities. The future of Indian S&T and the developmental discourse needs to recognize these albeit weak very diverse capacities, capabilities, gains and governances as the central feature.