‘India spends lowest on social research’
India stands lowest among BRICS nations on social science research (SSR) expenditure, according to a 15-yearlong study carried out by the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR). According to the study, a bare 7% of the journals are being published in Hindi, while 84% are in English.
Explaining the financial challenges, Prof Sukhadeo Thorat said, “One of the critical issues that social science confronts is inadequate funding, which affects the strength of faculty and infrastructure, research output, and quality of research. In 2010-11, the share of expenditure on SSR as percentage of the total Union budget was 0.025%, whereas it was 0.86% for pure science research. Whether we take expenditure on SSR as ratio of the Union budget, or ratio of GDP, or per capita expenditure in comparison to BRICS countries, India lags behind in spending on SSR in significant degree.”
The findings are published as a book -Social Science Research in India Status, Issues & Policies- which is jointly edited by Prof Sukhadeo Thorat, chairman, ICSSR, and Dr Samar Verma, Senior Program Specialist, Think Tank Initiative. The study has also been published by the Oxford University Press.
In 2011, the Review Committee of the MHRD had recommended increase in funding gradually, from Rs 700 crore for 2012-13 to Rs 1,854 crore in 2016–17 for ICSSR. It also recommended an annual corpus of Rs 200 crore.
Prof Thorat said, “A comparative study of SSR between India, China, and Brazil reveals that in 1995 the production of SSR in India was higher than China and Brazil, but in 2007, China overtook India. Clearly, during the period 1997-2007, Indian social science production, relative to China, stagnated, resulting in China leaping ahead in global share in volume. However, India managed to improve its quality in terms of citations compared to China, but remained short of Brazil, another BRIC country. This indeed calls for policies to expand the volume of SSR.” The study found that of a total of 2,131 journals, about 84% (1,801) are published in English, only 9% in English and in Hindi/ regional language, and 7% in Hindi/ regional language.
Dr Samar said: “A major problem in social science is the paucity of researchers in the universities and research institutes, particularly the latter. The average number of teachers per social science department is only seven across all universities in India, which is very low. ”
According to the study, out of the total 311 research institutes in the country that were analysed, about one-third are government institutes managed by ministries. These institutes have good infrastructure, but poor research faculty. The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), under its new Director General O.P. Singh, who took over the helm of the agency less than two months back, has become the latest entrant into Twitter, months after its “cousins” BSF, ITBP and CRPF debuted on Twitter.
Apart from helping the common people who approach the agency through Twitter, the CISF, which has the maximum number of interface with the common people when compared to other central forces, plans to use Twitter to showcase the work it has been doing.
“Despite doing the same work, we are sometimes not given the same importance by the public or the babus nor is our work appreciated or acknowledged. Unlike the other central security forces, we have to do the maximum interface with the public, face their anger when they are frisked or asked to stand in a queue, which our people accept with a smile. The intention behind coming on Twitter is to facilitate a two way communication, one where we listen and act to the griev-