Basic Research

In any institution involved with teaching or working on scientific topics - like universities, R&D laboratories or major Government Laboratories - it is necessary to provide opportunities for people to carry on research activities. This fact was pointed out recently, in no uncertain terms, by the eminent astrophysicist Prof. Jayant Narlikar in his lecture to the Kerala Science Congress. Though the mandated work like “teaching, departmental work, project work”, etc., are to be done by the scientific staff in the institution, their intellectual capabilities will soon dry up if they restrict only to those tasks, because the human brain wants something new to stimulate it always. Science managers who ignore this point will be eventually destroying the institution.

I wrote this some years back. Scientific labs which followed a corporate structure might have realized the mistakes!