T he Indian government created the Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research (IISERs) to offer students an intellectually vibrant research environment and to bring them into research at a relatively — vis-à-vis the Indian milieu — early stage.
Today, going by awards, fellowships or global achievement and recognition, there are few outstanding scientists in positions of authority on the IISER Boards. People familiar with the IISERs’ functioning today describe a situation where the administration is losing its ability to keep up with students’ needs vis-à-vis a good education in basic science. The institutions prize autonomy as an essential ingredient of good science, including in the form of scientists being able to decide which questions are worth pursuing and with what resources. Top-down control is inimical to this vision. The IISER statutes specify, among others, the secretary of higher education and the director of the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru too. suboptimal appointments or outright vacancies are objectionable as they can lead to policy paralysis — at best While publicly funded science should be publicly accountable. There are also signs of churn among sitting government officials. Interim appointments are routine and vacancies can arise during transitions. Ex-officio positions also change when officials move between posts. But taken together, several IISERs are operating under temporary or incomplete leadership. it matters for each institution’s credibility and vision While there is no rule that the chairperson of a scientific institution must be a scientist. The Boards can benefit from people with expertise in administration, industry, finance, and public policy — but there is a strong case to draw the leadership of institutions focused on basic science from the scientific community, where there are many people with distinguished research careers and substantial experience in running academic and research organisations. By design, the directors and the Board have the power to institute positive changes. However, as a senior scientist at one of the IISERs put it, “There is no vision or imagination and no sense of leadership propelling the institution towards its core goals of carrying out high-quality frontier research in and teaching basic science at an international level. The Indian government’s choices are weakening the IISERs’ institutional autonomy. With ‘outsiders’ and people whose attention is already divided between multiple institutions as leaders, scientists have less control over decisions that affect their work.
That said, the government also brought the IISERs within the statutory framework of the National Institutes of Technology, Science Education and Research Act 2007, which required each IISER to have a Board of Governors that included senior government officials and other government nominees.
The government had earlier appointed the finest scientists to the IISERs’ helm before dropping the practice.
