SCENES FROM THE INDIAN ACADEMIA: I

Policies shaping up Indian academics themselves need to be shaped up properly. But as long as we have people like Arjun Singh lording over the HRD ministry, that will never be get done and, conversely, the things will get worse from here onwards. A lot can be written about what is wrong with Indian academics and you will still not be able to write enough and bring to the fore the malaise that plagues it. I have been a teacher, teaching undergraduates and postgraduates for more than two decades. I have seen the system from the inside and am one of several who have served and continue to serve the system. So, rather than lamenting and being another bore who indulges in lamenting, I think it is better to write juicy little snippets that bring to the fore this malaise. That way, it is interesting for people to read and that way even smaller ills that plague the system will be exposed. There will be a series of these snippets. But mind well, while enjoying reading these, do not forget the seriousness of the issue at hand.

Correct

I walk into the NEERI library and request the librarian to allow me to refer to a journal.
`Do you have a letter from your employer?’ she asks apathetically.
`No. But I am a lecturer,’ I show her the ID card.
She takes the card but doesn’t look at it. `That is all very well. But you will have to bring a letter of request from your principal.’
`But ma’am I would require just about an hour. Only that much and no more, ’ I persist.
`I am sorry. But that’s the rule. We can’t allow anyone to just walk through.’
`But I am not anyone. I am a lecturer. And well, several of my students work here. One of them is even doing Ph.D. under me,’ I am trying hard to shrug off the `anyone’ label and am not succeeding at all by the look on her face - she looks as if she is trying hard to suppress a belch.
`That is all very well. But you will have to get a letter from your employer.’
`I have to go back then?’ It’s not a question. I am actually trying to appeal to her good sense, to her sense of empathy for an academic turned back without getting anything for his troubles.
`I am afraid, yes,’ she decrees. No empathy here.

Next day I approach the principal. She hears me out patiently. `You get a letter typed on my letterhead. I will sign it,’ she says. So magnanimous of her.
I hurry over to Ms. David and write out in a legible hand what I want to get typed. It reads as follows:

To,
The Librarian,
NEERI,
Nagpur.

Dear Madam,
Dr. Avinash Upadhyay , a lecturer in this college, may please be allowed to consult the NEERI library for a period of six months. The college will feel obliged if he is extended all the services that the library normally provides its readers.
Thanks.
Principal
XYZ College

`Come after two hours and collect it,’ Ms. David says pointing her hand to the enormous pile of paper indicating she is very busy.
Two hours later I collect the letter and take it to the principal. On her face is something that makes me wonder whether she has an ulcer in her alimentary canal. She reads the letter and frowns.
`No. No. This won’t do at all. What is this “please” and this “obliged?” I am the principal. I am not going to request a librarian. No. This won’t do. Look here, Upadhyay, you come after an hour and I will have the letter ready. The correct letter,’ she waves her hand; I am dismissed.
I loiter around. Talk to other lecturers. Smoke a cigarette. Drink a cup of tea. Kill time and hunger since it is past lunch time and I can’t go home yet. The I go back and the principal hands me over the letter, the one which is correct. It reads as follows:

TO WHOM SO EVER IT MAY CONCERNS

Dr. Avinash Upadhyay, who a lecturer (biochemestry) in our esteemed college, wish to consult a few libraries for which we have no objection and he is not overlooking his classes or practical classes therefore the question of objection do not arise.
For notice of librarians.

The Principal.

I decide not to visit the library after all. With such a correct letter to present, who would?
Everything around here is correct. The Librarian is correct - she is going by the rules. The principal is correct - is she not greater than the librarian? The letter, well it is correct- did not the principal herself say so? With everything so very correct, it is very surprising that academic matters suffer.

While we are talking about libraries, here is a wonderful rule that our University has ( many other Universities complement ours in this regard, or so have I heard) : a student who registers for Ph.D. will receive eight library cards entitling him to borrow eight books at any given time while a lecturer in a college affiliated to the University will get only two! So if you are a Ph.D. guide to a student, you will get only two cards and your student will get eight. After all, research must get priority, shouldn’t it? It is also an implicit admission on the part of the University that its lecturers do not indulge in research. Another interpretation of the rule can be that research means doing Ph.D. and that once this degree is achieved, research, for that individual at least, is over. Take the interpretation you like best.
Both are true!