Autonomy for Excellence in Research

undertaken in various fields like sociology, science, education, technology, literature, environmental studies etc.  If we see the growth of our system per se then one should also expect growth in the number of researchers but unfortunately there is a general feeling that in the process of increasing the number, it is the quality of research that has been compromised.  This can be attributed to factors like:

 

no objective studies have been made – a general complaint made against research.
no standard definition on quality of researches.
It has only become a distinguishable qualification in one’s academic achievement to give us an edge over others.
They seem to be more of opinion studies and less of innovations – this can be justified from the very few number of patents from research registered in our country.

 

Mr. Das, a teacher in the University of Delhi for the last 30 years, says that to the question whether the candidate has ever read a book in the social sciences from cover to cover, the answer is usually negative.  The ignorance of elementary facts is matched by eloquence on generalities.  Dissertations have a long list of references.  However candidates are unable to remember the argument of a research paper or book, although they have themselves referred them .

 

Most of the researches follow a standard format and has a questionnaire on topics such as “Attitude of working women towards marriage”, “Prevalence of drug addiction among Youth”.  The questionnaire is administered to about 150-200 respondents and compilation is done and the students are not required to learn the use of data sources, no intensive field work, nor well designed survey research, no statistical reasoning and they also get published normally in departmental journals, bringing disrepute to Indian Universities.

 

Several cases of malpractices in dissertations and, publication of already published data are observed due to lack of quality in research.  This tendency of plagiarisation can be directly traced to the proliferation of publishers & subsidies from Government and NGOs.

 

However there are also students located in different universities and research institutes who continue to produce professionally competent research works.  The evidence for this is available in the fact that we find monographs of young Indian scholars in the list of books of the most reputed national and international publishers.

 

HOW TO ACHIEVE EXCELLENCE IN RESEARCH?

Sound Research has to be built up with care.
Some institutes have nourished sound research through their efforts and they should provide opportunities to young talented persons located in institutions where such facilities are not provided.
Upgrade the text books to reflect the development of the last 50 years in various fields.
Proficiency in reading in English language for graduate students must be made necessary.
Policies for recruitment or promotion should be on the basis of academic competence rather than on political influence.
UGC has to relax its regulation to avoid the proliferation of substandard doctoral degrees as a premium for teaching posts.
Supervisors should not be pressurised to accumulate credits for producing large number of students under his or her guidance.

AUTONOMY FOR DEFINING EXCELLENCE IN RESEARCH

Research has to be creative, innovative, should be breaking the box and even out of the box.  This means there should be autonomy in the formulation of research problems rather than standardized research problems.

We are increasingly seeing the old working class being replaced by the service class with innovative ideas.  This creative class requires the introduction of fundamental changes in the design discipline i.e. transdisciplinary research which can bring about innovative research outcomes.

Autonomy has to be provided to question the relativity of the age old axioms rather than trying to establish the cause-effect relationships through research work.

Instead of standardising the research activities, efforts should be made to evolve new procedure.  This will prevent malpractices by the candidate as well as by the supervisor and this will help to produce quality research work.

It can be argued that a good teacher does not necessarily mean a good researcher and vice versa.  Hence autonomy must be provided in creating the right environment that would foster research attitude among teachers rather than making it a prerequisite for a Lecturer or Research Associate post.  This then will ensure excellence in research.

 

 

 

LIMITATIONS FOR AUTONOMY IN RESEARCH

After all, civilizations and cultures are the cumulative result of researches.  The degree of a civilization’s advancement depends on the quantity and quality of its research outputs. 

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